Congress should make Trump’s permitting reform permanent Image By Chris Barnard President Trump began his second term in office with a whirlwind of action on everything from securing the border to making government more efficient. In his first 24 hours in office, he issued more than 200 executive orders, including a declaration of a national energy emergency and the formation of a National Energy Dominance Council, giving his cabinet secretaries special powers to expedite the permitting process for energy projects nationwide. This is a continuation of President Trump’s first term when he jumpstarted a conversation about needed reforms to the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) to cut red tape and let America build. Unfortunately, President Biden overturned these executive actions. This has highlighted the need for congressional action on permitting reform. Our energy emergency Congress should cement permitting reforms through legislation so a future president cannot simply undo President Trump’s executive orders. Enacting stable, efficient permitting reform is long overdue. To the president’s point, we are in an energy emergency. Despite projections that energy demand will grow at unprecedented levels, energy projects have to wait an average of four years just to get a permit. In some cases, it took longer to obtain a permit than to build the project, like a transmission line in Wyoming that waited nearly two decades before it got the green light to break ground. During the Biden years, environmental regulations and bureaucratic red tape delayed even clean energy projects. Keeping up with the AI revolution, beating China and reducing global emissions will be impossible without serious reexamination of our energy permitting process. Clearly, burdensome red tape is a policy choice — one we can’t afford. A path forward The good news is that key congressional leaders recognize the need to fix the system permanently. Last Congress, Republicans in the House and the Senate presented valuable reform proposals that would have expedited leasing and judicial review as well as updated NEPA. Democrats and Republicans were unable to reconcile their differences, though, and the bills died in the 118th Congress. With a Republican trifecta now in place, the GOP must move faster and bolder on permitting reform during the reconciliation process. With a little bit of creativity, we can pass some permitting reform measures under reconciliation. The job won’t be done, however, until Congress can pass a comprehensive permitting bill with bipartisan buy-in. There is wide consensus that the United States needs an all-of-the-above energy strategy, responsibly utilizing the diverse variety of our natural resources to power our nation’s future. Moreover, we must upgrade existing transmission lines and build more to meet energy demand nationwide. It’s estimated that there are more than 2,600 gigawatts of energy capacity awaiting connection to the grid, largely from clean sources like solar, wind, and battery projects. These are bipartisan priorities that should be able to get the Senate to 60 votes. What’s at stake While energy projects languish in our permitting system, our rivals in China are building two coal plants each week and expect to have more than 150 new nuclear plants by midcentury. The United States has built a grand total of two nuclear plants in the last three decades. China has also planned more than 260 gigawatts of transmission projects to transport energy across the country while the U.S. has approved just three. No one wants to lose to China, and Congress has the power to turn the tide. President Trump promised a new age of American energy dominance, but there’s work to be done in order for his administration to deliver. For this age of energy dominance to endure, Congress will need to take serious and substantive action. We cannot allow permitting reform to become another project that gets bogged down in Washington. Chris Barnard is the president of the American Conservation Coalition (ACC). Follow him on X @ChrisBarnardDL. *The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of EnergyPlatform.News.
