Exchange during EPW Committee hearing underscores Curtis’ commitment to permitting reform, state autonomy, and energy innovation
Washington, D.C. – During a Senate Environment and Public Works Committee hearing, U.S. Senator John Curtis (R-UT) todayhighlighted the promising role carbon capture technologies play in supporting affordable, reliable, and clean energy production. During his exchange with expert witnesses—Kevin Connors from the Environmental Research Center and Dan Yates from the Ground Water Protection Council—Curtis expressed frustration with bureaucratic obstacles preventing companies in Utah from implementing innovative technologies. He specifically pointed to permitting delays at the federal level and underscored the importance of the USE IT Act, which aims to streamline the approval process for carbon management projects. He noted that the FAST Act, initially designed for surface transportation projects, should be leveraged to expedite permitting for carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) projects.
A transcript of the exchange between Senator Curtis and the witnesses can be found below and video can be found here.
Senator Curtis: Thank you. Madam Chair. I actually would like to pick right up where my colleague left off. Utahns, I think, find themselves equally as concerned about leaving this earth better than we found it. Clean air, clean water. And, clearly, the ability to take carbon out of the air is a very, very important part of that.
I firmly believe our nation’s energy security depends on what I call affordable, reliable, and clean energy. Carbon capture can play a critical role in achieving that balance. Companies in Utah are eager to innovate, but often face delays in obtaining approvals from federal agencies to implement new technologies. The USE IT Act is an important law that clarifies the role of federal research agencies in advancing carbon management technologies, including carbon capture, through research, development, and demonstration efforts.
Additionally, the USE IT Act ensures that carbon capture, utilization, and storage projects qualify for streamlined permitting under the FAST Act, which was originally designed to expedite the review of surface transportation infrastructure projects.
Mr. Yates or Mr. Connors or both, currently only two carbon capture and sequestration projects are listed as FAST-41 covered projects on the permitting dashboard for federal infrastructure projects. What actions can the Administration take to fully implement the USE IT Act, particularly ensuring a more efficient permitting process?
Dan Yates: Thank you, Senator Curtis. That’s a really great question. And so, one of the problems for states as they apply for primacy is the EPA uses what they call a crosswalk, which can be a very good tool, but it’s a complicated tool and there is not very good transparency to states on the process of where they are within primacy. So, making that a more transparent process. Training that is for both states and EPA simultaneously on what the crosswalk’s purpose is and how it’s to be used, would be very helpful in speeding primacy.
And so, if we can get states primacy faster, we’ve already talked a great deal today about how states are more efficient with their permits, and so I would say, an answer to your question is, is reviewing EPA’s process causing them to be more transparent? Often states will get a copy of the crosswalk with things highlighted, but no description of what any of those highlights mean, right? And so, specific questions to states on what is holding up the primacy process. It’s EPA’s role to determine whether or not a state’s rules and regulations meet or exceed federal. It’s not the state’s role to do that. But we’re getting confusing information back from EPA during that primacy process.
Curtis: Thank you. Go ahead, Mr. Connors.
Kevin Connors: So, as we’ve mentioned, there’s, last I checked, 161 well permits that have been backlogged at the EPA regional offices. So, the number one solution is there’s states that are in the pre-application process to apply for primacy. If EPA were to grant Texas alone primacy, 35% of those applications would go to the state of Texas. There’s a lot of projects in Texas. If EPA were to grant primacy to the states that are in the queue that are pursuing primacy, it’s about 40%.
And there’s several states that have announced that they’re pursuing primacy. That’s another 50% of the applications. Those other 50% of the applications are in states that have not indicated that they’re interested in pursuing class six primacy. EPA could focus their resources on California and Illinois, where there’s a lot of projects today. But granting states primacy that have applied and expediting that process, is crucial to alleviating the backlog.
And second of all, EPA can incentivize more states applying for primacy and, requesting that authority from EPA if they knew that EPA was going to expedite that process, I think there would be an advantage there.
Curtis: That’s great. Madam Chairman, we need to talk to Mr. Zeldin and give him a few minutes to get his feet underneath him and then light a fire underneath him. And I’d like to agree with my colleagues about just the difficulty of Class VI permits. And I don’t need to go deeply into that because I know it’s been discussed today, but I do want to add my voice to that.
Mr. Connors, what resources can the federal CCUS Permitting Task team, in coordination with the DOE, provide to states? Particularly those with Class VI primacy, like Utah, to assist in the review of permits?
Connors: The Underground Injection Control Program historically, and I think it’s been around for about 40 years now, historically, there’s grants that the states apply for through EPA, and there’s funding resources to those states that have primacy. For the history of Class VI, which began in 2010 when EPA published the Class VI regulations, there has been no resources through those UIC grant applications.
So, the states are applying for and administering those Class VI programs really with their own state funding to do so. And so, additional funding for the states to have those resources to implement their Class VI programs would be extremely helpful.
Curtis: Thank you. I thank the witnesses, but I also thank the Chair. This is a really important topic, and I suspect most of America doesn’t really understand fully the potential here. So, thanks for holding this hearing and I look forward to additional discussions. I yield my time.