After failing to secure a long elusive deal this week on easing approvals for all kinds of energy projects, Senate negotiators and an ideologically diverse army of lobbyists are eyeing September as a new deadline.
Major legislation usually doesn’t get done during an election year, but top lawmakers on both sides insist permitting reform can get done, even if there’s grumbling about the Trump administration’s actions against wind and solar.
Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.), chair of the Environment and Public Works Committee, said during a sit-down interview with POLITICO that Democrats want this as much as she does.
“Anytime you’re in a negotiation, especially when you’re as anxious as I am to reach the end, you always wonder: Am I getting tooled here? Am I getting dragged on?” Capito said. “But we haven’t had that impression at all, as frustrating as the length of time has been for us.”
Capito said getting a permitting deal done in September would deliver policy and political wins for both Republicans and Democrats, and that both Majority Leader John Thune and Minority Leader Chuck Schumer have indicated to her in recent conversations that they back the goal.
But for all the common ground in both parties around encouraging more energy production and accelerating projects to help address affordability concerns, permitting also touches on thorny issues for congressional Republicans, Democrats and this White House.
Some Democrats are open to negotiating changes to bedrock environmental laws like the National Environmental Policy Act and Clean Water Act, but their allies in the environmental community are wary of giving away too much.
And Republicans are skeptical of taking authority away from states over interstate power lines, and they could be wary of being perceived as trying to claw back power from Trump.
“Some of these are very sensitive policies,” Capito said. “We have proven that when things come together, they come together quickly. There’s always a risk of somebody holding out for one thing or another. We run that risk, but this is what negotiating is about.”
For Republicans and the Trump administration, a deal could unlock their goals of onshoring manufacturing and addressing energy affordability concerns from voters.
For Democrats, a deal could ease the build-out of more clean energy that is expected to be the predominant form of new power demand, while protecting solar and wind from persistent attacks by the Trump administration.
“That’s the attitude we would take, that this is a win-win for everybody,” Capito said. “It’s not just Marcella Shale [natural gas] or coal mines in West Virginia or offshore wind in Rhode Island. They would say we’re tying the hands of the president. We would say the president’s setting a legacy here that is long lasting. Maybe they could both be true at the same time.”
Environment and Public Works ranking member Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) said he would prefer to avoid kicking the issue yet again to the post-election lame-duck period, when Democrats could have more leverage if they were to regain power.
“The sooner we can get this done the better,” Whitehouse told POLITICO. “We’re in quite a good leverage point right now for a whole bunch of reasons, and we’re in as good a position as we’re going to be to get a good, meaningful, effective bill.”
Whitehouse reiterated that the Trump administration is “not even close” to satisfying Democrats’ demands to ease off its actions against solar and wind.
“There’s a major reset that they need to get to,” Whitehouse said.
Senate Energy and Natural Resources Chair Mike Lee (R-Utah) and ranking member Martin Heinrich (D-N.M) are the other two top negotiators. Knotty grid issues fall within their purview.
‘Get it right’
Capito and other Republicans who favor certainty for all forms of energy projects have also been frustrated by the Trump administration’s moves and have been working behind the scenes to push the White House to change course.
They have made little headway against the Department of Defense’s blockade on wind project approvals and the Interior Department’s elevated reviews and scrutiny for all wind and solar projects on public land.
Interior has begun to ease up on some solar approvals, but Democrats are also peeved at a new Trump administration proposal to roll back National Historic Preservation Act tribal consultation requirements.
Capito said Thursday she doesn’t expect a major course correction from the Trump administration before senators reach an agreement and that any deal would hinge on Democrats having trust in the White House to implement permitting changes fairly.
“I don’t expect those answers will come until we say ‘OK, we’ve reached an agreement,’” Capito said. “I think the administration needs to see something they think can really be a meaningful change on permitting reform.”
Mike Sommers, CEO of the American Petroleum Institute, said he is still maintaining “a glimmer of hope” for a fall deal, but he expressed frustration in arguing that other business groups aren’t pushing as hard for a deal this Congress.
“We have been working with all sides to impress upon them the importance of getting this done for all energy sources,” Sommers said.
Frank Macchiarola, chief advocacy officer at the American Clean Power Association, said negotiators were smart to push back their timeline for a deal in order to “get it right.”
He added the group is aligned with Democrats who “really do need to see a level of commitment on the part of the administration to permit renewable projects” before agreeing to a deal. He called the Pentagon’s stalling of wind approvals a “red line.”
‘Can we sell it?’
A federal judge in Oregon on Thursday granted renewable energy groups’ motion to temporarily force the Pentagon to complete its reviews for stalled onshore wind projects.
But permitting negotiators have said even as they’ve earned favorable court rulings against Trump actions, they need to see proof the administration is changing behavior on its own.
Another key factor Democrats are wrestling with is how to sell any deal to environmental groups that will include trade-offs that could benefit fossil fuel projects and constrain their ability to stop projects.
“Can we sell it? The environmental community is going to have to support it. Maybe not everybody, but the community’s got to support. Same with the tribes. They’re not going to let go of their negotiating priorities and their voice,” said Sen. John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.).
More advocates have adapted to the reality that environmental permitting laws are barriers to building clean energy in a moment of skyrocketing power demand.
“We would like to see permitting reform, but we want to do it right,” said Pete Wyckoff, vice president of policy at the environmental group Evergreen Action.
“There are probably NGOs that are in our space that are less completely bought into the ‘we need to get things built faster, and that requires permitting reform.’ We are in the mode of ‘go Whitehouse, go Heinrich, come back with something so amazing that it’s obvious that we should push forward even with Trump in the White House.’ We are not in the ‘stop talking until there’s a trifecta’ mode.”
Still, environmental leaders are wary of Democrats giving away too much in any deal while Trump remains in power. A point of contention is how much to limit a state’s power to block projects under the Clean Water Act.
“Reforms are needed, but the devil’s in the details,” said Christy Goldfuss, executive director of the Natural Resources Defense Council. “We need cheaper energy right now.
“So, no deal should move unless it stops the administration from illegally canceling clean energy projects and supports the build-out of desperately needed transmission to feed the grid and help stop rising electricity prices.”
Kelsey Tamborrino contributed to this report.
