Rural Utilities Service Background The Rural Utilities Service (RUS) makes loans to subsidize electricity service by electric cooperatives in rural areas. Created in 1935 to bring electricity service to rural America, this program is now obsolete and should be eliminated. At a cost of about $10 million annually, RUS loan programs favor select businesses, offer little benefit to consumers, and subsidize the release of carbon pollution.
Green Scissors Proposal Eliminate loan programs for electricity service in the Rural Utilities Service, saving about $10 million annually or $50 million over five years.
Project Hurts Taxpayers RUS programs are no longer needed. Nearly 100 percent of rural America now receives electric service. Furthermore, RUS subsidies favor some businesses over others. Only rural electric cooperatives are eligible to receive RUS loans, although other businesses provide rural communities with electricity. In addition, competing systems for providing electricity to consumers - such as solar or natural gas systems - are put at a competitive disadvantage by RUS subsidies.
Project Hurts Environment RUS programs subsidize pollution. A study by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency shows that RUS low-interest loans represent the second largest direct energy carbon emissions subsidy. By simply eliminating RUS low interest loans, the U.S. could potentially reduce carbon emissions by 3.9 million metric tons by the year 2010.
$50 million