Senate reaches bipartisan deal on permitting bill to speed approvals of new energy projects

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WASHINGTON (AP) — Senators from both parties said Wednesday they have reached a bipartisan deal on legislation aimed at speeding up permitting reviews for new energy and infrastructure projects that now face yearslong delays as lawmakers seek to meet growing demand for electricity and other forms of energy.

The bill, proponents argue, would cut down the arduous timeline for getting big energy projects off the ground at a time when demand is rising because of mushrooming data centers for AI. The bill would ensure data centers are forced to pay for the increased electricity they use and would mark a significant change to a landmark environmental law that critics say slows down the process of building energy products.

Republican Sen. Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, chair of the Environment and Public Works Committee, called the bill “a major step toward making it faster and more efficient and easier to build infrastructure projects” of all types while maintaining important environmental protections.

“The American people sent us here to do big things. This is a big thing. It’s monumental and it’s legacy-setting,” Capito said at a news conference at the Capitol where she was joined by Republican Sen. Mike Lee of Utah and Democratic Sens. Martin Heinrich of New Mexico and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island. The four senators lead the chamber's energy and environment panels.

Heinrich said the bill “will mean more energy on the grid, more good-paying jobs, and lower electricity costs for families and businesses. And as data centers drive demand for more power, it will ensure they pay their fair share of the grid upgrades they require – not leave that bill to American families."

A vote on the bill won’t happen until after the midterm elections — reflecting the fraught political reality as elections loom that could change partisan control of both chambers. But the bill represents a rare instance of bipartisanship over the country’s energy policy as lawmakers from both parties agree on the need to build new energy projects of all types.

Lee, who chairs the energy committee, said he is confident the bill will be approved in a lame-duck session in November, noting its bipartisan support and encouragement from business and environmental groups.

Whitehouse, the top Democrat on the environment panel, also was hopeful but said Democrats were still seeking clarity on how the bill will prevent President Donald Trump's administration from blocking wind and solar projects.

He and Heinrich, the top energy Democrat, have decried what they call Trump's “reckless and vindictive assault on wind energy” that includes repeated actions to block large-scale wind projects under construction off the East Coast. The administration suspended five offshore wind projects in December, citing unspecified national security concerns.

The projects later moved forward after federal judges intervened. A federal judge also struck down Trump’s executive order blocking wind energy projects early in his second term.

Brad Campbell, president of the Conservation Law Foundation, an environmental advocacy group, panned the deal, saying it “appears to adopt a fossil fuel industry wish-list.” He said the bill could roll back clean water and endangered species protections, limit judicial review and curtail the power of the Environmental Protection Agency and states to consider impacts of energy projects.

“Striking this deal in the waning days of this Congress, in a pact and on a schedule that preclude public input or amendment, before midterm elections that can only improve the prospects for a more balanced approach, is indefensible,” Campbell said in a statement.

In a statement, the White House said the bill would “deliver transformative policies to lower Americans’ energy and housing costs, drive new construction and investment in American infrastructure, and create American jobs.”

Trump's opposition to wind power has been a consistent stumbling block to a deal on permitting reform, which Democrats say can only go forward if the administration agrees to allow previously approved projects to move forward.

Trump recently offered to ease his administration’s holdup on renewable energy projects, in part to entice Democrats to agree to a permitting deal.

Whitehouse called the proposal reasonable but said the overall issue remains “unresolved.”

Capito was confident such obstacles can be overcome.

Both parties recognize that for far too long, “America has had a permitting system filled with delays, expenses, red tape, uncertainty,'' she said. "Too long, too expensive. And we’ve seen projects that should be finished more quickly (take) decades” to complete.

The Senate bill would limit legal challenges under the National Environmental Policy Act, a bedrock environmental law that requires federal agencies to consider a project’s possible environmental impacts before it is approved. The law has increasingly been blamed for stalling projects of all types.

Challenges under the National Historic Preservation Act also would be restricted. The law protects Native American cultural treasures and other important artifacts.

The bill would ease siting of interstate transmission lines and strengthen the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s authority to review major projects at the same time as state reviews, helping needed projects move through the overall permitting process more quickly.

The bill also would require data centers to pay for all associated transmission costs, preventing costs from being passed on to families or businesses.

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Associated Press writer Jennifer McDermott contributed from Providence, R.I.