Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid last night punted the chamber's consideration of the $31.625 billion energy and water 2012 appropriations bill until after Thanksgiving.

The Nevada Democrat had hoped to merge the spending legislation for the Energy Department, Army Corps of Engineers and Interior Department water programs with two separate spending bills to help fast track them through the chamber this week, but that effort was foiled Tuesday. Afterward, amendments to the energy and water language began pouring in, slowing the debate.

But Reid has not pulled the measure from the Senate's legislative calendar. Instead, he is postponing consideration of the energy and water appropriations bill in favor of more time-sensitive measures, like a defense authorization measure and a separate package of appropriations bills that includes stopgap funding language to keep the government running after its current funding authorization expires at the end of this week.

"The normal process would be to pull the bill and come back some other time," Reid said last night on the Senate floor. "We're not going to do that."

Instead, he is keeping the measure open so the chamber can return to debate on it "at a minute's notice."

"Around here there's down time, and we should be able to finish this bill in a day, a day and a half once we get these amendments worked out," he added.

But because of the other measures on the schedule this week, that debate on energy and water appropriations won't likely come until after the Senate returns from Thanksgiving.

The measure would fund DOE, the Army Corps of Engineers and the Bureau of Reclamation for the rest of this fiscal year. A hefty portion of the spending language is directed toward national security programs within DOE, but the measure also directs spending priorities at DOE science and technology research programs and critical Army Corps water infrastructure programs.

The House this summer approved a $30.6 billion spending bill for the three agencies.