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WASHINGTON, Dec 18 (Reuters) - The U.S. Congress voted on Friday to repeal the 40-year-old ban on exporting U.S. crude oil in an energy policy shift sought by Republicans as part of a bipartisan deal that also provided unprecedented tax incentives for wind and solar power.

The Senate, on a 65-33 vote, passed a $1.1 trillion government spending bill that included the measure to lift the export ban and provide five-year extensions of tax breaks to boost development of renewable energy. Earlier in the day, the House of Representatives passed the measure, 316-113.

The legislation now goes to President Barack Obama, who was expected to sign it into law.

The deal was hammered out in secret talks among congressional leaders over two weeks.

Senators Lisa Murkowski, a Alaska Republican, and Democrats Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota and Martin Heinrich of New Mexico had worked for more than a year to get the deal.

Democrats who backed the deal asserted that its provisions encouraging renewable energy were important for combating global climate change.

"This is the biggest deal for addressing climate change that we are going to see," Heinrich said in an interview.

Heinrich said Democrats may not have been able to get a better deal even if they controlled both chambers of Congress, now led by Republicans. Many Republicans have opposed Democratic proposals to address climate change.

Congress, concerned about U.S. dependence on imported oil, imposed the crude oil export ban after the Arab oil embargo of the early 1970s that sent gasoline prices soaring and contributed to runaway inflation. Arab members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) imposed the embargo following the U.S. decision to re-supply the Israeli military during the 1973 Arab-Israeli war.