Sen. Hickenlooper, Rep. Peters introduce bill to speed permitting of transmission lines
U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper (D-CO) and U.S. Rep. Scott Peters (D-CA) introduced legislation last week a that would expedite the siting and permitting of interregional transmission lines.
The Streamlining Powerlines Essential to Electric Demand (SPEED) and Reliability Act would change the process for getting approvals. Currently, both the Department of Energy (DOE) and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) must conduct environmental reviews for the same proposed transmission line. This bill would require a single environmental review by FERC and allow state and federal reviews to happen simultaneously, among other provisions.
“Good energy projects have been mired in government red tape, slowing our clean energy transition and the lower costs and new jobs it will bring,” Hickenlooper said. “As our Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act work in tandem to pull us into the future, our legislation will help ensure our outdated permitting processes won’t hold us back.”
The SPEED and Reliability Act would speed up permitting processes for national interest transmission lines by at least five years. It would do this by:
• Allowing individual transmission lines to be deemed as “national interest high-impact transmission facilities,” rather than requiring DOE to identify broad corridors that developers might want to build lines in;
• Requiring FERC to conduct a single environmental review for national interest high-impact transmission facilities, rather than requiring duplicative reviews by FERC and DOE;
• Denoting that qualifying transmission lines must be at least 345 kilovolts, add or increase transmission capacity by at least 750 megawatts, and cross at least two states–or one state and the Outer Continental Shelf–limiting eligibility to the most significant transmission lines;
• Imposing firm timelines for DOE’s designation process and FERC’s subsequent permitting and environmental review to ensure the entire federal permitting process is complete within 2 years and 3 months.
“If we want to avoid a climate catastrophe, we cannot wait a decade plus for individual transmission lines to be approved,” Peters said. “Our commonsense proposal builds on our past work to dramatically speed up how we build transmission lines to ensure that we can deliver energy to the areas that need it the most. This will lower costs for consumers, improve reliability, and help secure America’s energy independence.”
The bill has the backing of the American Clean Power (ACP).
“ACP has long called for a pragmatic, bipartisan approach to improving the transmission permitting process. The SPEED and Reliability Act creates a far more efficient and predictable process for building critical electric system infrastructure. Powering America’s future will require a larger, stronger, and more resilient electrical grid. The reforms in this bill are essential to build an electric power system that reflects our local and national interests,” Jason Grumet, CEO of ACP, said.
