U.S. Sen. Jerry Moran (R-KS) on June 13 introduced a bipartisan, bicameral bill to extend the publicly traded partnership ownership structure to clean energy power generation projects and transportation fuels.
Sen. Moran cosponsored the Financing Our Energy Future Act, S. 1841, with bill sponsor U.S. Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE) to provide investors of clean energy projects access to an existing tax advantage currently available only to investors in fossil fuel-based energy projects.
“The Financing Our Energy Future Act will allow the renewable energy sector to utilize the MLP structure for project development, making it accessible to a broader and deeper investment pool that can drastically reduce the time and cost associated with deploying new energy technologies,” said Sen. Moran, referring to a master limited partnership (MLP), a business structure that gets taxed like a partnership while the ownership interests are traded like corporate stock.
If enacted, the measure would modify the federal tax code to allow energy-generation and renewable fuel companies to form MLPs, according to Sen. Moran’s office, which said newly eligible energy resources would include solar, wind, marine and hydrokinetic energy, fuel cells, energy storage, combined heat and power, biomass, waste heat to power, renewable fuels, biorefineries, energy efficient buildings, and carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS).
“The United States has the largest and most efficient capital markets in the world, yet our renewable energy companies rarely have access to those markets,” Sen. Moran said on Monday. “In order to grow our economy and increase our energy security, sound economic tools, like MLPs, should be expanded to include additional domestic energy sources.”
Among the 11 lawmakers joining Sen. Moran as an original cosponsor of S. 1841 are U.S. Sens. Susan Collins (R-ME), Joni Ernst (R-IA) and Cory Gardner (R-CO).
A companion bill, the same-named H.R. 3249, was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives by U.S. Reps. Ron Estes (R-KS) and Mike Thompson (D-CA).