Bill#3684, The famous Infrastructure Bill just recently passed.
I decided on a whim to look at the 2,700-page bill and peruse to see what it is all about.
A Few Observations:
First, these bills are tough to read, with many references to other documents that are not easy to read/understand. I understand why congress does not read the bills…we will find out later.
There are many reports due in the first year before any actual work gets done - many of these projects won’t see any actions completed during Biden’s term - suspect Democrats know this and don’t care.
The average oversight fund is .5%, the average administrative cost is 3% - Government will grow fast - maybe this really is a ‘jobs act.’
A reminder that half this 1T$ bill is new money, and the other is extending approval of prior actions. It was hard for me to separate the two.
I saw nothing below a $1M budget - I believe this is beneath Congress’s level of interest. I mean, what could we do with a million dollars?
The myriad of budget items belies that this was a request from every government office to list anything they needed, especially as related to climate or equity. You only have one chance….
The items specified to track will tell you everything; jobs created and improvements to habitat/climate. Wouldn’t you want the traffic to flow faster or the ports to be more efficient? Jobs will naturally show up in existing unemployment and average wages report.
Bills, Abbreviated:
$2M, Study the operation of freight trains that are longer than 7,500 feet, due in two years.
$4.7B, Revise the crash data collection system to include the collection of crash report data elements that distinguish individual personal conveyance vehicles, such as electric scooters, busses, and bicycles, from other vehicles involved in a crash - due in three years.
$5B Cap orphaned wells that have been abandoned to stop methane leaks. There is an estimated 1-3 million uncapped wells, many of which we don’t even know where to find. Think this will be done in our lifetime? BTW, this may be the only climate money spent that is deserving - methane is very dangerous, and this effort will help this severe issue.
An updated inventory of orphaned (abandoned) wells located on Federal, Tribal, and State, and private land.
An estimate of the quantities of methane and other gasses emitted from orphaned wells.
the number of jobs created and saved through the plugging, remediation, and reclamation of orphaned wells;
the acreage of habitat restored
$2.25B, Port infrastructure development program
Projects that improve the resiliency of ports to address sea-level rise, flooding, extreme weather events, earthquakes, and tsunami inundation, as well as
Projects that reduce or eliminate port-related criteria pollutant or greenhouse gas emissions
Port electrification or electrification master planning;
Providing idling reduction infrastructure
Purchase of cargo handling equipment and related infrastructure
Worker training to support electrification technology
Electric vehicle charge or hydrogen refueling infrastructure for drayage, and medium or heavy-duty trucks and locomotives
Would you please tell me which of these items will result in a more efficient port to clear the backlog of ships waiting to unload? I only find one - the rest is all about climate. Notice the overhaul to electric - look for this everywhere - they are getting us off fossil fuel and onto the grid, which they then can control (by controlling what is used to produce electricity, i.e., solar, wind, hydropower.)
$1B, Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety
Community-owned utility (NOT for-profit entities) - to repair, rehabilitate, or replace its natural gas distribution pipeline system or portions thereof or to acquire equipment to (1) reduce incidents and fatalities and (2) avoid economic losses. Also, some money here for electric ferries? Grants will be made to those projects with the most risk of leaks and potential for jobs. Note: Government facilities only!
$3B, Railroad Crossing Elimination Program
$16B National Railroad Passenger Corporation
eliminating Amtrak's deferred maintenance backlog of rolling stock, facilities, stations, and infrastructure
acquiring new passenger rolling stock to replace obsolete passenger equipment used in Amtrak's long-distance state-supported services, and associated rehabilitation, upgrade, or expansion of facilities used to maintain and store such equipment
Bringing Amtrak-served stations to full compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act Could a private business have survived this long with ignoring Federal Law?
eliminating the backlog of deferred capital work on Amtrak-owned railroad assets not located on the Northeast Corridor
projects to eliminate the backlog of obsolete assets associated with Amtrak's national rail passenger transportation system, such as systems for reservations, security, training centers, and technology
$27.5, Bridge replacement rehabilitation, preservation, protection, and construction program
$5B, Strategically deploy electric vehicle charging infrastructure and establish an interconnected network to facilitate data collection, access, and reliability.
$5B, airport terminal development address the aging infrastructure of the nation's airports
$1B, National Culvert Removal, Replacement, and Restoration
$500M, Low Income Home Energy Assistance
$3.5B, domestic and community sanitation facilities for Indians
$250M Legacy Road and Trail Remediation Program
$100M for construction of temporary roads or reconstruction and maintenance of roads to facilitate forest restoration and management projects that reduce wildfire risk. Note that this does not reduce fire risk; it just fixes roads so they can access the areas that need to be remediated.
$3B, lead service (water) line replacement
$10M, developing battery recycling best practices
$200M shall be for restoring fish and wildlife passage by removing in-stream barriers
$131.5M shall be for housing, family support, safety, and training facilities for the Coast Guard.
$120M construction of childcare development centers
$42.5B, Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment Program
Note one of the unique ways they are using to pay down the cost of this bill - selling fuels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve! Secretary of Energy shall draw down and sell from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve 87,600,000 barrels of crude oil during fiscal years 2028 through 2031. It shall be deposited in the general fund of the Treasury during the fiscal year in which the sale occurs.
So in your community, these projects could:
Rebuild your community-owned gas facilities that have fallen behind on maintenance
Replace any leaded pipe to houses
fix energy losses in poor peoples houses
replace some culverts
Build a new battery charging station
Replace an old bridge that the state has been ignoring
Provide Broadband service
Rebuild the airport terminal
Eliminate that pesky railroad crossing that delays you once every few months
Cap some old wells that have been leaking methane - meanwhile no legislation in place to increase the reserve each new well needs to make to insure that it will be plugged by the company instead of the taxpayers.
Tear out those barriers in the stream that the fish have to navigate.
Fix some forest roads that are closed to the public.
This is Easy! sounds so wonderful….I can’t wait!
I suggest that the Conservatives/Independents create a non-governmental entity that tracks all these projects and reports monthly. Democrats will be constantly reminding us of the great promise of this bill with little follow-thru. We need to start educating John Q Public about the extreme difficulty the government will have in completing these projects in a few years.
Question ... How can we pay down the cost of this bill - selling fuels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve when we are weaning ourselves from petroleum? Who will purchase it and at what price when it's unusable?
Question ... How can we pay down the cost of this bill - selling fuels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve when we are weaning ourselves from petroleum? Who will purchase it and at what price when it's unusable?