Senator Chuck Grassley issued the following comment about the inclusion today of a one-year extension of the wind-energy tax credit in The Family and Business Tax Cut Certainty Act of 2012 reported by the Committee on Finance. The overall package includes an amendment written by Senator Grassley and accepted this morning as part of the modified proposal of Committee Chairman Max Baucus.
Grassley comment:
"The wind-energy production tax credit is designed to level the playing field for this renewable resource against coal-fired and nuclear electricity generation. The credit has been successful in developing clean, renewable, domestically produced wind energy and the jobs that go along with it. The one-year extension approved today would make the credit effective for producers for one more year. In the face of an effort to end this incentive, I persuaded committee leaders to include the extension in a way that keeps it at full value and that puts the wind-energy production tax credit in a strong position for the floor debate this fall. No single energy tax incentive should be singled out over others, energy-related and not, before a broad-based tax reform debate. Congress and the President need to take up tax reform to make American business more competitive with lower rates, a broader tax base, and a simpler code. Until tax reform is undertaken, workers and employers need certainty in existing tax law."
Description of the Grassley amendment to The Family and Business Tax Cut Certainty Act of 2012:
Extend for one year, through December 31, 2013, the section 45 production tax credit for wind which expires on December 31, 2012. Modify placed-in-service date for wind to a "begin construction" rule.
Background information:
Senator Grassley authored the legislation that created the wind-energy production tax credit in 1992 and has won passage of extensions a number of times.
Today, wind-energy production supports 75,000 American jobs and drives as much as $20 billion in private investment. During the last five years, 35 percent of all new electric generation in the United States was wind. There are nearly 400 wind-related manufacturing facilities in the United States today, compared with just 30 in 2004.
Conventional energy sources, including oil, gas and nuclear, enjoy countless tax incentives and many of them are permanent law.
