The House Appropriations Committee approved the legislative branch spending bill yesterday, releasing a committee report that endorses plans to turn the Capitol power plant into a cogeneration facility.

The bill sets a fiscal 2013 budget of about $3.3 billion for Congress, funding everything from staffers' salaries to a handful of legislative branch agencies. That is $34 million, or about 1 percent, less than this year's budget. It does not include Senate-only expenses, which will be set by the upper chamber E&E Daily, May 22).

The Architect of the Capitol would be the hardest hit at a time when Architect Stephen Ayers is struggling to fix crumbling buildings while increasing Congress' energy efficiency. Ayers requested $668 million; his office would get $444 million under the bill.

But House appropriators did include funds to begin renovations to turn the Capitol Power Plant into a cogeneration facility.

In his fiscal 2013 budget request, Ayers had asked Congress for permission to enter a utility energy services contract, in which a company will pay the upfront costs of the construction.

That would enable the plant to generate electricity and use the byproduct to heat the Capitol complex. The plant -- which heats and cools congressional buildings -- used coal until a few years ago, providing a constant embarrassment for Congress as it pushed energy efficiency. It now runs mostly on natural gas.

The committee report to the spending bill does not give explicit approval for the UES contract, but it states the panel's support for the project and allocates more than $23 million for power plant upgrades.

At the appropriation panel's markup yesterday, however, the focus was on members' representational allowances. The pot for MRAs -- which covers individual budgets for lawmakers -- would stay the same as this year, at $1.2 billion.

Rep. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) offered an amendment to limit how lawmakers can use that money in promoting their events or activities online, according to CQ Today.

Lawmakers use the money to send pamphlets and emails to constituents in a process known as franking. But Flake said some of his colleagues were beginning to use it for online advertising. The amendment failed.