August 21, 2025
America’s energy future hinges on our ability to build and develop. But whether it’s increasing all forms of energy production, expanding critical pipeline capacity, or modernizing the grid to meet a looming electricity demand, our permitting system is broken. While well-intentioned, the laws underpinning America’s permitting system were simply designed for a different era. Outdated, vague, and increasingly weaponized through litigation, these statutes now delay or derail the very energy projects our economy and national security depend on.
Although Congress has taken important steps toward streamlining environmental reviews and permitting through the Fiscal Responsibility Act and the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, and recent efforts by the Trump administration are improving the regulatory process, comprehensive, durable congressional action that goes further is essential to give project developers and federal agencies more certainty and stability in the environmental review process and broader permitting system.
Demand for reliable, affordable energy is surging. Domestic electricity needs are projected to grow by up to 25% by 2030, driven by AI and advanced manufacturing. At the same time, geopolitical conflicts and constrained infrastructure continue to drive up energy costs.
Energy Affordability: Without pipeline infrastructure, abundant American energy cannot reach the communities that need it most. This is especially true in the Northeast, where years of bad policies have increased costs and limited consumer choice. Pipeline constraints have forced utilities to import liquefied natural gas (LNG), sometimes from adversarial nations, or to rely on more expensive forms of energy.
Grid Reliability: In its July 2025 Report on Evaluating U.S. Grid Reliability and Security, the U.S. Department of Energy warned that delays in building out infrastructure are straining our electric grid. The report noted that “with projected load growth, retirements increase the risk of power outages by 100 times in 2030,” emphasizing the need for faster, coordinated approvals of reliable baseload generation.
AI Superiority: Winning the AI race is an existential economic and national security imperative, and it will require an unprecedented amount of electricity to prevail. But China is winning the race to power AI, increasing capacity by over 600% since 2000 while U.S. generation has remained largely flat. Today, China possesses more than double the generation capacity than that of the U.S. – a trend that must be reversed.
Without durable, bipartisan permitting reform, energy producers and infrastructure developers will continue to face permitting backlogs, inconsistent environmental reviews, and litigation warfare, delaying projects that could keep energy prices more affordable, create jobs, and secure our energy future.
Modernizing the NEPA Process & Judicial Reform: Originally enacted in 1970, the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) was intended as a procedural statute to inform environmental reviews for “major Federal actions significantly affecting the quality of the human environment,” which can include energy development and infrastructure projects. Only amended twice since then, its broad and largely undefined statutory framework has fueled subjective reviews and frivolous lawsuits, leaving it the most frequently litigated environmental law in the country.
Between 2013 and 2022, over 420 federal court rulings were issued for 210 energy projects. Litigation delays impact all forms of energy, with challenged projects spending a median of 3 years between agency approval and a final court decision, with many cases running years longer. Environmental review documents like Environmental Impact Statements and Environmental Assessments, or the ability to use Categorical Exclusions, have also historically been fraught with inefficiencies that compound project delays.
In its unanimous landmark Seven County Infrastructure Coalition v. Eagle County ruling earlier this year, the Supreme Court reaffirmed NEPA’s procedural nature, clarified that its scope is limited to a specific proposed action and not its indirect or cumulative effects, and mandated that reviewing courts give substantial deference to the agency of record. Congress should finish the job and provide statutory clarity for those elements that will still have to be interpreted by the agencies and courts to curb endless litigation, as well as update NEPA to restore focus, remove redundancies, and ensure reviews are proportional to a project’s actual impacts.
These reforms would preserve legitimate procedural environmental review while allowing for more timely, predictable project approvals, and already have bipartisan support. The Standardizing Permitting and Expediting Economic Development (SPEED) Act, led by House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Bruce Westerman (R-AR) and Rep. Jared Golden (D-ME), represents a bipartisan breakthrough that recognizes the urgency of reforming NEPA.
Ensuring Permit Predictability for Federal Lands: Today, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) often fails to effectively use the tools already provided by Congress to expedite the permit process on federal lands, leading to inconsistent agency implementation practices and added layers of reviews that cause significant project delays. The result is a backlogged permitting process, which for example can take anywhere from 139-1,000+ days for a routine Application for Permit to Drill (APD).
To accelerate project timelines, Congress should require that agencies follow through on existing efficiencies, expand the use of proven streamlining tools, and remove process barriers that have no meaningful environmental benefit. These reforms should include eliminating the federal APD requirement for directionally drilled wells from private surface where the federal mineral interest makes up a limited portion of the affected leasehold; ensuring the utilization of Categorical Exclusions for projects determined not to significantly affect the environment; and creating a permit-by-rule pathway or leveraging greater reliance on state permitting programs for federal onshore activities with low environmental impacts.
Providing Certainty Under the Clean Water Act: While the Clean Water Act (CWA) plays a critical role in protecting water resources, its implementation has at times been leveraged to delay or block projects for reasons unrelated to water quality. For example, Section 401 narrowly authorizes states to certify that potential discharge into waters of the U.S. as a result of afederally licensed project complies with state water quality standards. In practice, misusing the certification process has become a favored tactic by a handful of states to oppose projects based on policy goals unrelated to water quality.
To end Section 401 abuses, Congress should further clarify its scope and establish enforceable certification timelines to stop states from wielding disproportionate power over projects in the federal interest. In addition, reissuing and codifying nationwide permitting under Section 404(e) would protect this critical tool to more efficiently authorize common development activities with minimal impact to water quality.
Adding Common Sense to the Endangered Species Act: The Endangered Species Act (ESA) is intended to protect and recover species at risk of extinction. However, the statute hasn’t been substantially updated since 1988 and over time its implementation often results in overly broad listings of species, unclear critical habitat designations, and litigation-driven decision-making.
One solution to prevent significant permitting delays and unnecessary land use restrictions is to prohibit mass “mega petitions” for dozens or even hundreds of species at a time. This tactic virtually guarantees the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service will miss statutory deadlines and agree to large scale-settlements in response to lawsuits – known as “sue-and-settle” – that force rushed and inadequately supported listing decisions.
Congress should also restore predictability and balance in designations by defining ‘habitat.’ For too long, agencies have wielded undue discretion to block the development of areas that are completely uninhabitable to listed species. Comprehensive permitting reform provides Congress a unique opportunity to strengthen regulatory certainty around ESA protections to achieve better outcomes for both wildlife and the communities that depend on responsible energy development.
The federal permitting process should be viewed as a bipartisan policy tool that works efficiently, predictably, and transparently for all project developers and public stakeholders. Bipartisan momentum exists. Congress should seize this opportunity to enact durable, common-sense reforms that meet today’s energy needs without sacrificing environmental standards or economic opportunity.
