The "BIRD Energy and US-Israel Energy Center Reauthorization Act of 2025" expands and reauthorizes energy cooperation between the U.S. and Israel, increasing funding and extending the program through 2035, while adding new areas of cooperation like hydrogen and fusion energy.
Debbie Wasserman Schultz
Representative
FL-25
The "BIRD Energy and US-Israel Energy Center Reauthorization Act of 2025" expands and reauthorizes energy cooperation between the U.S. and Israel through 2035. It increases funding for cooperative research and the Energy Center, and broadens the scope of cooperation to include areas like hydrogen, fusion energy, and cybersecurity. This aims to foster innovation, enhance energy security, and promote economic benefits for both nations.
US-Israel Energy Partnership Gets Funding Boost and Tech Scope Expansion Through 2035
This bill, the "BIRD Energy and US-Israel Energy Center Reauthorization Act of 2025," essentially doubles down on energy cooperation between the United States and Israel. It extends existing joint programs through 2035 (Sec 5) and significantly increases the authorized funding for specific initiatives from Fiscal Year 2026 through 2031 (Sec 3). The goal, according to the bill's findings (Sec 2), is to boost joint research and commercialization of energy technologies, aiming for economic benefits and job creation in both countries.
More Green for Green Energy (and More)
So, what's changing on the money front? The bill proposes upping the annual authorized funding for cooperative research grants via the Binational Industrial Research and Development (BIRD) Energy program from $2 million to $5 million (Sec 3). Think of this as more seed money for joint US-Israeli projects focused on turning energy ideas into actual products. Additionally, funding for the separate United States-Israel Energy Center, which supports broader research collaboration, gets a proposed boost from $4 million to $7 million annually for the same period (Sec 3). This increased investment signals a stronger commitment to finding shared solutions in the energy sector.
Expanding the Energy Innovation Menu
It's not just about more funding; the scope of cooperation is also getting wider. The bill explicitly adds several cutting-edge fields to the list of eligible cooperation areas (Sec 4). We're talking about things like hydrogen energy, fusion energy (the long-term, big-potential stuff), industrial decarbonization (making factories cleaner), carbon management, agrivoltaics (combining farming and solar power), grid modernization, and crucially, cybersecurity for energy infrastructure. Adding these categories means the partnership is officially looking beyond traditional areas and aiming to tackle emerging energy challenges and opportunities, like protecting our power grid from digital threats or developing next-generation clean fuels.
Locked In for the Long Haul
The legislation extends the overall framework for United States-Israel Energy Cooperation all the way through 2035 (Sec 5), with the specific funding authorizations for the BIRD Energy and Energy Center programs running through 2031 (Sec 3). This long-term commitment provides stability for researchers and companies involved in multi-year projects. It essentially tells innovators in both countries that this collaborative structure is expected to be around for a while, potentially encouraging more ambitious joint ventures in areas from energy storage to making industrial processes more efficient.