H.R. 4091 would reauthorize activities of the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E), an agency tasked with researching and developing transformative energy technologies, through fiscal year 2024. The bill also would amend ARPA-E’s requirements for submitting annual reports and strategic vision roadmaps to the Congress.
H.R. 4091 would authorize appropriations totaling $2.9 billion over the 2020-2024 period. In 2019, the Congress appropriated $366 million for ARPA-E. Because CBO scores continuing resolutions on an annualized basis, in 2020 CBO assumes that the same amount of funds will be available under the current continuing resolution (Public Law 116-59). As a result, CBO estimates that H.R. 4091 would authorize an increase in spending subject to appropriation in 2020 of $62 million, the difference between the authorized amount and the annualized amount under the continuing resolution. Based on historical spending patterns, and assuming appropriation of the authorized and necessary amounts, CBO estimates that implementing H.R. 4091 would cost $690 million over the 2020-2024 period and $1.8 billion after 2024.
The costs of the legislation (detailed in Table 1) would fall within budget function 270 (energy).
