Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies: Overview of FY2025 Appropriations

Contents

• Introduction
• Overview of FY2025 Legislative Action
• Overview of Agencies in the Bill
• Title I. Department of the Interior
• Title II. Environmental Protection Agency
• Title III. Related Agencies

Summary

The Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies appropriations bill—often called the Interior bill—contains funding for about three dozen agencies and entities. They include most of the Department of the Interior and agencies within other departments, such as the Forest Service (Department of Agriculture) and the Indian Health Service (Department of Health and Human Services). The bill also provides funding for the Environmental Protection Agency, arts and cultural agencies, and other entities. Perennial issues for Congress include determining the amount, terms, and conditions of funding for agencies and programs.

From the start of FY2025 on October 1, 2024, until March 15, 2025, Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies were funded at FY2024 levels, with certain exceptions, under short-term continuing appropriations resolutions.

FY2025 full-year appropriations of $43.37 billion for the Interior bill were provided in the Full-Year Continuing Appropriations and Extensions Act, 2025 (P.L. 119-4), enacted on March 15, 2025. Most agencies and entities in the Interior bill received FY2025 appropriations at the FY2024 level, and some received lower appropriations in FY2025 than in FY2024. However, the total FY2025 appropriation was $2.04 billion (4.9%) more than the FY2024 total of $41.33 billion; this was due in part to increases for DOI wildland fire management, the Payments in Lieu of Taxes Program, the U.S. Forest Service, and the Indian Health Service, among other agencies and programs.

Relative to other FY2025 proposed totals, the FY2025 appropriations law contained

• $666.4 million (1.6%) more than President Biden's FY2025 request of $42.71 billion,
• $1.30 billion (3.1%) more than the FY2025 House-passed amount of $42.07 billion, and
• $1.56 billion (3.5%) less than the FY2025 Senate Appropriations Committee-reported total of $44.93 billion.

The $43.37 billion was broken out unevenly across the three major titles in the FY2025 Interior bill, as is typically the case. DOI agencies in Title I received $15.25 billion (35.2% of the total). EPA, funded in Title II of the bill, received $9.14 billion (21.1% of the total). For about two dozen agencies and other entities funded in Title III, the FY2025 appropriations law contained $18.98 billion (43.8% of the total).

In earlier action on FY2025 appropriations, on July 24, 2024, the House passed H.R. 8998 with $42.07 billion for Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies. On July 25, 2024, the Senate Appropriations Committee reported S. 4802 with $44.93 billion. The two bills, like the President's FY2025 request, included $2.75 billion for certain wildfire suppression activities under an adjustment to discretionary spending limits, the maximum available for FY2025. The FY2024 total appropriation of $41.33 billion for the Interior bill (P.L. 118-42, Division E) had included $2.65 billion (the FY2024 maximum) under the discretionary cap adjustment for wildfire suppression.

It can be challenging to make comparisons between FY2024 and FY2025 total appropriations for agencies and accounts that receive funding in the annual Interior bill. This is due to advance appropriations for the Indian Health Service, rescissions of prior year appropriations, supplemental appropriations in laws other than the annual appropriations laws, mandatory appropriations provided to agencies under laws within the jurisdiction of authorizing committees, and other variables. Including some or all of these variables would provide different comparisons between FY2024 and FY2025 appropriations for agencies and accounts that receive funding in the annual Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies appropriations bill.

Appropriations for Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies, by Major Title, FY2024-FY2025

Source: Prepared by CRS with data from the House and Senate Appropriations Committees. Notes: Amounts shown on the bars may not sum to totals shown due to rounding. In general, amounts represent regular annual appropriations for the pertinent fiscal year (FY2024 or FY2025), rescissions of prior year appropriations, and advance appropriations for the Indian Health Service (in Title III). With regard to rescissions, the FY2024 enacted total of $41.33 billion reflects total rescissions of $563.0 million under three separate titles of the law: $27.5 million in Title I, $1.5 million in Title II, and $534.0 million in Title IV. The FY2025 House-passed total of $42.07 billion reflects $55.0 million in rescissions in Title IV.

Introduction

This report examines FY2025 discretionary appropriations for Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies. Issues for Congress include determining the amount of funding for agencies and programs in the Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies appropriations bill—often called the Interior bill—and the terms and conditions of such funding.

The report focuses on the regular (annual) appropriations for the Interior bill. It first presents a short overview of FY2025 legislative action and a brief comparison of FY2024 enacted appropriations and FY2025 appropriations requested by President Biden, included in H.R. 8998 as passed by the House, in S. 4802 as reported by the Senate Appropriations Committee,¹ and enacted into law. The report then provides an overview of the agencies and other entities funded in the Interior bill. Finally, the report presents a table showing appropriations by agency/entity for FY2024 enacted, FY2025 requested, FY2025 House-passed, FY2025 Senate committee-reported, and FY2025 enacted. Agency and bill totals in this report generally reflect rescissions. In general, this report does not detail supplemental, advance, and mandatory appropriations.²

Appropriations are complex. Budget justifications for some agencies are extensive (often hundreds of pages long) and contain numerous proposed funding, programmatic, and legislative changes for congressional consideration. Further, appropriations laws provide funds for numerous accounts, activities, and sub-activities. Their accompanying explanatory statements provide additional directives and other important information. This report does not provide in-depth information at the agency, account, and subaccount levels, nor does it generally detail budgetary reorganizations or legislative changes proposed or enacted for FY2025. For information on a particular agency or on individual accounts, programs, or activities administered by a particular agency, see the Congressional Research Service (CRS) products provided in footnotes throughout this report; congressional clients also may contact the key policy staff listed at the end of this report.³ In addition, selected reports related to appropriations for Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies, such as individual agencies (e.g., National Park Service) or crosscutting programs (e.g., Wildland Fire Management), are listed under "Interior & Environment Appropriations" on the "Appropriations" Issue Area page on the CRS website, which is available to congressional staff.⁴

Overview of FY2025 Legislative Action

FY2025 full-year appropriations for Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies were included in P.L. 119-4, the Full-Year Continuing Appropriations and Extensions Act, 2025, enacted on March 15, 2025. The law contained $43.37 billion for agencies in the Interior bill.⁵

As full-year FY2025 appropriations had not been enacted at the start of the fiscal year on October 1, 2024, Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies received appropriations for FY2025 under continuing resolutions (CRs) that in general provided appropriations at FY2024 levels in P.L. 118-42, Division E.⁶ However, the CRs contained certain exceptions—for instance, for the National Park Service for security and visitor safety activities related to the Presidential Inaugural Ceremonies and for the U.S. Forest Service for wildland fire suppression.⁷ A CR was in effect until March 15, 2025, when full-year appropriations were enacted.

In earlier action, for FY2025, President Biden had requested $42.71 billion for the roughly three dozen agencies and entities funded in the Interior bill. On July 24, 2024, the House passed H.R. 8998 with $42.07 billion for Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies.⁸ On July 25, 2024, the Senate Appropriations Committee reported S. 4802 with $44.93 billion for Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies for FY2025.⁹

For FY2025, the President's request, House-passed H.R. 8998, Senate committee-reported S. 4802, and P.L. 119-4 included $2.75 billion for certain wildfire suppression activities under an adjustment to discretionary spending limits, the maximum available for this fiscal year. Under law, an adjustment can be made to discretionary spending limits to accommodate enacted funding for wildfire suppression.¹⁰

On March 9, 2024, the President signed into law the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2024 (P.L. 118-42). Division E contained $41.33 billion for Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies for FY2024. For FY2024, $2.65 billion was the maximum for wildfire suppression activities under and the discretionary cap adjustment, and the FY2024 law contained this amount.

Different methods of comparing Interior appropriations would lead to varying dollar and percentage differences between FY2025 enacted appropriations and FY2024 enacted appropriations, as well as among FY2025 appropriations that were requested by the President, contained in H.R. 8998, and contained in S. 4802. Among other variables, the comparative approach used in this report for the two fiscal years reflects advance appropriations for the Indian Health Service and rescissions of prior year appropriations for various purposes. Rescissions are treated as an offset to new appropriations. Including these variables, the FY2025 appropriations requested by the President, contained in H.R. 8998, and contained in S. 4802 would have provided different levels of increase over FY2024 enacted appropriations. Specifically, the request sought an increase of $1.38 billion, the House-passed bill would have provided an increase of $739.6 million, and the Senate committee-reported bill would have provided an increase of $3.61 billion over FY2024 levels. Moreover, the FY2025 level in S. 4802 was $2.23 billion higher than the President's FY2025 request and $2.87 billion higher than the FY2025 House-passed level.

FY2025 full-year appropriations of $43.37 billion for the Interior bill were provided in the Full-Year Continuing Appropriations and Extensions Act, 2025 (P.L. 119-4), enacted on March 15, 2025. The law provided most agencies and entities in the Interior bill with FY2025 appropriations at the FY2024 level, and some received lower appropriations in FY2025 than in FY2024. However, the total FY2025 appropriation was $2.04 billion (4.9%) more than the FY2024 total of $41.33 billion; this was due in part to increases for DOI wildland fire management, the Payments in Lieu of Taxes Program, the U.S. Forest Service, and the Indian Health Service, among other agencies and programs.

Relative to other FY2025 proposed totals, the FY2025 appropriations law contained

• $666.4 million (1.6%) more than President Biden's FY2025 request of $42.71 billion,
• $1.30 billion (3.1%) more than the FY2025 House-passed amount of $42.07 billion, and
• $1.56 billion (3.5%) less than the FY2025 Senate Appropriations Committee-reported total of $44.93 billion.

The FY2025 appropriations law included $5.23 in advance appropriations but did not contain rescissions. The FY2024 appropriations law included $5.19 billion in advance appropriations as well as a total of $563.0 million in rescissions of prior year appropriations under three separate titles of the law. The FY2025 President's request did not include advance appropriations or rescissions. The FY2025 House-passed total included $5.98 billion in advance appropriations and rescissions of $55.0 million. The FY2025 Senate committee-reported total contained $5.46 billion in advance appropriations but did not contain rescissions. Figure 1 and Table 1 detail this comparison.

It can be challenging to make comparisons between FY2024 and FY2025 total appropriations for agencies and accounts that receive funding in the annual Interior bill. This is due to advance appropriations for the Indian Health Service, rescissions of prior year appropriations, supplemental appropriations in laws other than the annual appropriations laws, mandatory appropriations provided to agencies under laws within the jurisdiction of authorizing committees, and other variables. Including some or all of these variables would provide different comparisons between FY2024 and FY2025 appropriations for agencies and accounts that receive funding in the annual Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies appropriations bill.

Figure 1. Appropriations for Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies by Major Title, FY2024-FY2025

Source: Prepared by CRS with data from the House and Senate Appropriations Committees. Notes: Amounts shown on the bars may not sum to totals shown due to rounding. In general, amounts reflected in the figure represent regular annual appropriations for the pertinent fiscal year (FY2024 or FY2025), rescissions of prior year appropriations, and advance appropriations for the Indian Health Service (in Title III). With regard to rescissions, the FY2024 enacted total of $41.33 billion reflects total rescissions of $563.0 million under three separate titles of the law: $27.5 million in Title I, $1.5 million in Title II, and $534.0 million in Title IV. The FY2025 House-passed total of $42.07 billion reflects $55.0 million in rescissions in Title IV. The FY2025 enacted total of $43.37 billion did not contain rescissions.

Overview of Agencies in the Bill

The annual Interior, Environment, and Related Agencies appropriations bill includes funding and other provisions for agencies and programs in three federal departments and for numerous related agencies. The Interior bill typically contains three primary appropriations titles and a fourth title with general provisions.¹¹ Title I provides funding for most agencies in the Department of the Interior (DOI),¹² many of which manage land and other natural resource or regulatory programs. Title I also typically includes general provisions related to DOI agencies. Title II contains appropriations and administrative provisions for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Title III, Related Agencies, generally funds about two dozen other entities, including the Forest Service in the Department of Agriculture; the Indian Health Service in the Department of Health and Human Services; arts and cultural agencies, including the Smithsonian Institution; and various other organizations and entities. Title III also contains administrative provisions for some agencies funded therein. Title IV, General Provisions, typically contains additional guidance and direction for agencies in the bill. The following sections briefly describe selected major agencies in the Interior bill.

Title I. Department of the Interior¹³

DOI's mission is to conserve and manage the nation's natural resources and cultural heritage; provide scientific and other information about those resources; and exercise trust responsibilities and other commitments to American Indians, Alaska Natives, Native Hawaiians, and affiliated island communities.¹⁴ There are 10 major DOI agencies and 2 other broad accounts funded in the Interior bill that carry out this mission. Hereinafter, these 12 entities are referred to collectively as the DOI agencies. The DOI agencies and their functions funded in the FY2025 Interior bill included the following:

• The Bureau of Land Management administers about 244 million acres of federal public land, mostly in the West, for diverse uses such as energy and mineral development, livestock grazing, recreation, and preservation. The agency also administers 713 million acres of federal onshore subsurface mineral estate throughout the nation and supervises the mineral operations on Indian trust lands.¹⁵
• The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service administers 89 million acres of federal land within the National Wildlife Refuge System and other areas,¹⁶ including 77 million acres in Alaska. It also manages several large marine refuges and marine national monuments, sometimes jointly with other federal agencies. In addition, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, together with the National Marine Fisheries Service (Department of Commerce), is responsible for implementing the Endangered Species Act (16 U.S.C. §§1531 et seq.); promoting wildlife habitat; enforcing federal wildlife laws; supporting wildlife and ecosystem science; conserving migratory birds; administering grants to aid state fish and wildlife programs; and coordinating with state, international, and other federal agencies on fish and wildlife issues.¹⁷
• The National Park Service administers more than 80 million acres of federal land within the National Park System, including 433 separate units in the 50 states, District of Columbia, and U.S. territories. Roughly two-thirds of the system's lands are in Alaska. The National Park Service has a dual mission—to preserve unique resources and to provide for their enjoyment by the public. The agency also supports and promotes some resource conservation activities outside the National Park System through grant and technical assistance programs and cooperation with partners.¹⁸
• The U.S. Geological Survey is a science agency that provides physical and biological information related to geological resources; natural hazards; climate and land use change; and energy, mineral, water, and biological sciences and resources. In addition, it is the federal government's principal civilian mapping agency (e.g., topographical and geological mapping) and a primary source of data on the quantity and quality of the nation's water resources (e.g., streamgaging).¹⁹
• The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management manages development of the nation's offshore conventional and renewable energy resources in the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Alaska region. These resources are in areas covering approximately 2.5 billion acres located beyond state waters. This acreage is off all coastal states, although much of it (more than 1 billion acres) is in the Alaska region.²⁰
• The Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement provides regulatory and safety oversight for resource development on the outer continental shelf. Among the bureau's responsibilities are oil and gas permitting, facility inspections, environmental compliance, and oil spill response planning.²¹
• The Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement works with states and tribes to reclaim abandoned coal mining sites. The agency also regulates active coal mining sites to minimize environmental impacts during mining and to reclaim affected lands and waters after mining.²²
• The Bureau of Indian Affairs provides and funds various services to American Indians and Alaska Natives. The agency is responsible for programs that include government operations, courts, law enforcement, fire protection, social programs, roads, economic development, employment assistance, housing repair, irrigation, dams, Indian rights protection, implementation of land and water settlements, and management of trust assets (real estate and natural resources).²³
• The Bureau of Indian Education funds and provides education to Indian tribes and Alaska Natives. The agency funds an elementary and secondary school system, institutions of higher education, and other educational programs.²⁴
• The Bureau of Trust Funds Administration manages DOI's trust beneficiaries' financial assets. The agency provides fiduciary guidance, management, and leadership for Tribal Trust and Individual Indian Money accounts.²⁵
• Departmental Offices covers diverse offices and programs. In the FY2025 appropriations law, it covered the Office of the Secretary of the Interior, Insular Affairs, the Office of the Solicitor, and the Office of Inspector General.²⁶
• Department-Wide Programs covers varied programs and entities. In the FY2025 appropriations law, it covered DOI Wildland Fire Management,²⁷ the Central Hazardous Materials Fund, the Energy Community Revitalization Program, the Natural Resource Damage Assessment Fund, the Working Capital Fund, and the Office of Natural Resources Revenue.²⁸

Title II. Environmental Protection Agency

EPA administers various environmental statutes that have an express or general objective to protect human health and the environment.²⁹ Primary responsibilities include the implementation of federal statutes regulating air quality, water quality, drinking water safety, pesticides, toxic substances, management and disposal of solid and hazardous wastes, and cleanup of environmental contamination. EPA awards grants to assist states and local governments in implementing federal law and complying with federal requirements to control pollution. The agency also administers programs that provide financial assistance for public wastewater and drinking water infrastructure projects.³⁰

Title III. Related Agencies

In FY2025, Title III of the Interior bill funded about two dozen agencies, organizations, and other entities collectively referred to as the related agencies. Among the related agencies funded in the Interior bill, roughly 95% of the funding typically is provided to the following:

• The Forest Service in the Department of Agriculture manages 193 million acres of federal land within the National Forest System—consisting of national forests, national grasslands, and other areas—in 43 states, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands. It also provides technical and financial assistance to states, tribes, and private forest landowners and conducts research on sustaining forest resources for future generations.³¹
• The Indian Health Service in the Department of Health and Human Services provides medical and environmental health services for approximately 2.8 million American Indians and Alaska Natives. Health care is provided through a system of more than 600 hospitals, clinics, and health stations on or near Indian reservations. The agency, tribes and tribal organizations, and urban Indian organizations operate these facilities and programs.³²
• The Smithsonian Institution is a museum, education, and research complex consisting of 21 museums, the National Zoological Park (National Zoo), and 14 education and research centers, some located in other countries. Established by federal legislation in 1846 with the acceptance of a trust donation by the institution's namesake benefactor, the Smithsonian is funded by both federal appropriations and a private trust.³³
• The National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities make up the National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities. The National Endowment for the Arts is a major federal source of support for all arts disciplines. Since 1965, it has provided $5.6 billion in support of arts and awarded more than 158,000 grants, which have been distributed to all states, the District of Columbia, and U.S. territories. The National Endowment for the Humanities generally supports grants for humanities education, research, preservation, and public humanities programs; creation of regional humanities centers; and development of humanities programs under the jurisdiction of state humanities councils. It also supports a Challenge Grant program to stimulate and match private donations in support of humanities institutions. Since 1965, it has awarded over $6.4 billion in funding for more than 70,000 projects in all states, the District of Columbia, and U.S. territories.³⁴

Footnotes