President Joe Biden (D) on Saturday signed a package of appropriations bills that fund the Department of Defense and other agencies through Sept. 30 and extended a key federal nuclear indemnity program.
The bill extended Price-Anderson protections for Department of Energy contractors and commercial nuclear companies to Dec. 31, 2065 from Dec. 31, 2025 and quadrupled the financial protection the federal government must provide to these companies for nuclear incidents that occur outside the U.S.
Sens. Tom Carper (D-Del.) and Shelley Capito (R-W.Va.), the chair and ranking member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, included the Price-Anderson extension in the 1,000-plus-page spending bill.
The Department of Energy and the rest of the federal government now has stable funding for the remainder of the 2024 fiscal year, which ends Oct. 1. DOE’s final 2024 budget was part of a separate package of six appropriations bills that Biden signed on March 9.
