WASHINGTON, D.C. – Pennsylvania Senator Dave McCormick (R- PA) said nearly a trillion dollars worth in critical infrastructure projects are currently tied up due to federal permitting. He’s sponsoring legislation he said would rev up the economy, bring thousands of jobs across America and meet our energy demands.
“Essentially what’s happened is we have a number of laws that have been hijacked,” said the Senator. “The Clean Water Act, NEPA, even the nuclear regulatory process, they’ve been hijacked. They’ve been used to delay or kill energy infrastructure projects and so we’ve got about 1.5 trillion dollars worth of investments that are being held up.”
He’s introducing the Unlock American Energy and Jobs Act, which would streamline the federal permitting process. He said it addresses four areas: sets a one-year deadline for reviews, scraps what he calls outdated policy that forces liquified natural gas exporters to ask for case-by-case federal approval before selling American gas abroad, modernizes nuclear licensing and keeps permit approvals in effect even while legal challenges are pending.
“If you could make those changes it would be a huge economic opportunity for Pennsylvania because those investments would create tens of thousands, maybe even hundreds of thousands of jobs and it would help with the huge growth and energy demand,” said the Senator.
We asked the Senator about the concerns that permitting reforms might mean weaker environmental protections:
“This isn’t meant to replace the Clean Water Act, this isn’t meant to replace NEPA which is currently the environmental protection act and all that goes along with that,” said the Senator. “What this is meant to do is create a reasonable timeline where decisions can be made within a year. The activists, what they try to do is drag out the decision making where no investor can make the investment so it tries to bring a reasonable timeline, tries to make common sense and bring certainty when once a permit is given, that permit is final so it can’t be relitigated over and over again. So, what I would say to the critics is we can have both. Appropriate environmental protections with the existing laws which I support but we could also have a permitting process that allows for investment and growth in our economy that protects consumers, that allows energy prices to come down and frankly protects our national security.”
