Washington - Business Roundtable today released recommendations for additional federal permitting reforms, particularly for energy projects, to make it easier to build American infrastructure, increase domestic energy production, grow America’s clean energy capacity and expand access to key raw materials, including critical minerals.
“Business Roundtable welcomes the meaningful bipartisan reforms to the permitting process included in the Fiscal Responsibility Act and we encourage policymakers to build on that progress and enact additional reforms,” said Business Roundtable CEO Joshua Bolten. “By taking action on these policy recommendations, Congress can address escalating energy costs, critical minerals supply chain vulnerabilities, transmission constraints and other barriers to unleashing American energy.”
The Fiscal Responsibility Act made meaningful reforms to the permitting process, including Business Roundtable recommendations like:
- Requiring lead or joint lead agencies to supervise environmental reviews;
- Requiring single, page-limited environmental review documents;
- Establishing time limits on the environmental review process; and
- Expanding the use of categorical exclusions.
Business Roundtable encourages Congress to build on this progress by enacting additional reforms, including:
- Accelerating the permitting and construction of liquefied natural gas export infrastructure and associated pipelines to meet growing demand for exports;
- Specifying a statute of limitations of no more than 150 days for litigation resulting from federal permitting decisions;
- Further expanding the use of categorical exclusions or, where appropriate, granting immediate or accelerated approvals for pre-qualified projects with known environmental benefits;
- Encouraging community engagement early and often throughout the permitting process;
- Expanding access to key raw materials needed for the clean energy transition, including critical minerals; and
- Improving management of the interconnection application queue and regional and interregional planning.
In response to a special question posed in the Business Roundtable Q2 CEO Economic Outlook Survey, 82% of CEOs agreed reforming the U.S. permitting processes for energy infrastructure projects is necessary to improve American energy security and accelerate the clean energy transition.