LETTER: Commend Murkowski for clean energy priority

To the editor: Sen. Lisa Murkowski can always be counted on when it comes to commonsense clean energy policies. In fact, she recently called for a broad, bipartisan energy bill to be passed in early 2018. Hopefully, such a bill will include the renewal of the “orphaned” tax credits for renewable energy that were left out of the final tax reform bill. 

 

For now, Sen. Murkowski should be commended for making sure her colleagues on the tax reform conference committee understood that they must maintain a level playing field for clean energy. Her efforts helped protect 

 

80 percent of the value of the investment tax credit and production tax credit by repairing the base erosion anti-abuse tax found in the Senate’s bill.  

 

At the same time, she was among the most vocal supporters of reducing the corporate tax rate and eliminating the corporate alternative minimum tax, both of which will help many new and existing clean energy businesses thrive.  

 

I am grateful that Sen. Murkowski helped safeguard clean energy during the tax reform debate, because it represented a once-in-a-generation chance to get things right. By making clean energy a priority, she helped secure our energy future.