Exchange during EPW Committee hearing highlights Curtis’ commitment to streamlining permitting, supporting state-led energy innovation, and modernizing transmission infrastructure
Washington, D.C. — During an Environment and Public Works Committee hearing titled, “Improving the Federal Environmental Review and Permitting Processes,” U.S. Senator John Curtis (R-UT) underscored the urgent need for permitting reform to unlock energy development in Utah and across the nation. During his exchange with expert witnesses, Curtis highlighted Utah’s Operation Gigawatt as a leading example of state-driven innovation in geothermal, nuclear, and hydrogen energy. He called for the elimination of duplicative reviews, including those for housing development, as well as modernizing transmission infrastructure and delegating more permitting authority to states to reduce federal bureaucracy.
The panel included Jeremy Harrell, CEO at ClearPath; Carl Harris, Chairman of the Board at the National Association of Home Builders; and Leah Pilconis, General Counsel at the Associated General Contractors of America.
A transcript of the exchange between Senator Curtis and the panel can be found below and video can be found here.
Senator Curtis: Chairman Capito, Ranking Member Whitehouse, thank you for holding this hearing.
As I’ve been sitting here today, the best analogy I can think of is it feels like we’re on a train, and we all know it’s going to wreck. And everybody on the train has the answers, right? I mean, we could take these five witnesses and the few members that are here, if you lock us in a room and I think we could get to this. So, I’m grateful there’s hardly a topic that’s discussed more in Washington and is acknowledged as bipartisan. Yet, we can’t get it across the finish line. So, thanks for your work and working with our House colleagues. I pledge my support and anxiousness to help you in this matter.
Mr. Harrell, I’d like to, first of all, give you a shout out for the work you do in your organization. As you know, it’s been very, very important in my understanding of these issues. And I want to talk just a little bit about Utah. You know, Utah strives to be a leader on this. We have Operation Gigawatt that showcases the state’s interest in geothermal and nuclear and all these energies. And geothermal, it’d be hard to find an energy source that finds better agreement among everybody that this is something that’s important and needs to develop. And yet we struggle with permitting. And so, I want to ask you what additional measures could the federal government take to support state led efforts in expanding geothermal, particularly in a state like Utah?
Mr. Jeremy Harrell: Thank you, Senator Curtis. And thank you for your leadership on these issues over the course of your time in Congress and excited to see the next big things, here in the Senate as well.
It underscores a really key point. And Utah’s a great example nationwide of where federal, state, and local entities need to be synced up in the right way to drive new economic opportunities. And so, Project Gigawatt, focusing on how to leverage and grow new geothermal, new nuclear, new hydrogen development, in the state. And I think there’s four key things that I think could be particularly helpful for the federal process to sync up with that Utah strategy.
On the geothermal side, I think a no brainer is remove the duplicative environmental analysis that’s required for geothermal exploration. We should streamline that process. There’s a bipartisan bill in Congress considering that, and then if a site is feasible, it’s still going to have to move under an environmental process for the generation project. So, let’s take the environmental analysis out of it and kind of unleash innovators in that space. I think there’s a lot that we can do to streamline permitting at existing facilities that have been closed at brownfields.
I know your state is looking significantly at deploying small modular reactors and micro reactors that could unlock significant development in the state. We’re going to have to resolve some of these frictions with federalism, both on pipelines and transmission, that are out there to tap building out infrastructure for new hydrogen, for example, in the state. And so, there are some key things that I think will solve problems that we’re seeing nationwide but really will help unlock the Utah strategy.
Curtis: So, I’m going to come back to transmission. You’ve talked about it. It’s been talked about a lot here. And yet, just like the other parts of permitting reform, we’re not making progress. I’m going to stereotype Republicans here a little bit and say that we do struggle with this, right, in the whole aspect of permitting reform. Talk to me and particularly my Republican colleagues about transmission. What is it that we’re not getting? What is it we need to know, and how do we get this done?
Harrell: I think it’s about growing clean energy infrastructure as a whole. We need to build out more wires. And that’s not just about renewables. There’s projects that have been stifled by the judicial process that are connecting and putting new gas facilities on the grid. If we’re going to deploy new small, modular reactors and advanced reactors, the scale of rising demand and the amount of new generation we’re going to have to build potentially as big as the size of the Texas grid at a minimum over the next decade, virtually doubling the U.S. grid over the next decade, we’re going to need to connect to a lot of new resources in place. And ultimately, that means streamlining federal reviews, trying to find ways to make that process move more quickly.
And then, you know, providing some more clarity to the judicial process. I mean, transmission projects have seen significant delays. I mean, there’s multiple transmission projects in this country that have nearly turned 21.
Curtis: Well, listen, there’s some good proposals out there, and I’d just like to invite my Republican and Democratic colleagues, like, I’m anxious to work on this and be helpful and see if we can find a solution. Mr. Harris spoke on this. I was the mayor of my city. When I think of building regulations, I tend to think of the city, county, and state regulations. I think a lot of people don’t really understand that federal adds yet another layer of regulations on this. Can you both just speak quickly to that federal layer that people may not see?
Mr. Carl Harris: As a recovering mayor myself, part of a 12-step program, recognizing I had a problem and knowing there’s a higher power, it’s not me. No, I am and I currently sit on my planning and zoning commission. So, I know that of the 24% of the cost of a new home that’s directly related to government regulation, that local and state governments share in that responsibility to make sure that the permitting process at all levels is efficient.
Curtis: I’m almost out of time, and I want to make sure I give you just a quick response.
Ms. Leah Pilconis: Sure, I just add that where you can delegate or assign responsibility to the states, it can help streamline the process, such as through NEPA assignments, or where states can take over 404 permitting. Many states have done that with a 402 stormwater permitting process. And, that can reduce duplication and we’ve heard from our members it can very much streamline things.
Curtis: Thanks, all of you. And I yield my time.