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Floor Speech

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Mr. WHITEHOUSE. Mr. President, I am pleased to join my colleague from the Mountain State of West Virginia to talk about permitting reform. People listening should know that we work together well, that I like her personally, and that I am grateful to her for her support of important Rhode Island projects that we have gotten cleared.

On permitting reform, there has long been bipartisan interest-- interest to speed the construction of transportation projects on housing; interest to deliver cheaper, cleaner, and more reliable energy for American families.

As I have often said, the Federal Government often moves far too slowly, and permitting is a prime example of this. Projects undergoing environmental reviews are frequently stuck in limbo if just one Agency drags its feet. ``Interagency process'' is the technical term for multiagency decision-making. And interagency process is too often the enemy of effective governance, too often the executive branch refuge for incompetence, too often the executive branch shield against accountability, too often the executive branch screen of bureaucratic delay.

Permitting reform is a golden opportunity to fix this. We should make Federal permitting faster and more efficient, all while incentivizing project developers to engage with stakeholders early on in the process rather than drag it out. It currently takes far too long to build important projects in this country, and while Federal permitting is not the only bottleneck, it is frequently a major one.

In the last two decades, China has built more than 25,000 miles of high-speed rail lines, while the United States has completed zero. We can and must do better. Chair Capito and I are both ready to do our part to move permitting reform forward and, ultimately, across the finish line. We are already engaging with our colleagues in the Energy and Natural Resources Committee because those two committees have to work together to make this work. And I hope Republicans in the House are able to move to responsible legislation as soon as this fall.

But I must remind everyone again, because I have said this frequently, that it makes no sense for Democrats to agree to permitting reform until the Trump administration stops its lawless disregard for legislative authority and judicial orders. The lawlessness is rampant, and it is hurting people and communities and projects. Until the administration shows it will honor its oath to faithfully and impartially execute the laws--its constitutional oath--how can we trust that any legislative compromise on permitting reform will be executed fairly? And if we can't trust that, what is the point?

Trump has fired independent Agency commissioners, defied court orders, and threatened to weaponize the government against his perceived political enemies. His rescissions destroy bipartisan appropriations accords. The Trump administration's record on this is bad, and on energy policy, it is particularly awful.

The President declared a fake energy emergency despite record energy production in America. He defied the very dictionary by defining ``energy'' to exclude wind energy and solar energy, the fastest growing American energy sectors. He directed a halt to offshore wind permitting, even stopping work on an offshore wind project actively under construction.

Hang up your hardhats, guys; we are shutting down the project.

So if we want a permitting bill, this unconstitutional lawlessness has to end. It is raising utility bills, and it is endangering our energy supply. Just last year, 95 percent of the new energy on the grid was wind, solar, and batteries--95 percent. This lawlessness kills that growth.

And--I will add--we need offshore wind. I have a permitting reform proposal for offshore wind. With demand skyrocketing, we need clean, reliable, and domestic resources like offshore wind. Just ask the head of the North American Electric Reliability Council, the impartial source on grid reliability.

Our constituents are now facing higher costs on everything from groceries to homeowner's insurance, thanks to climateflation. Permitting done right will deliver cheaper, cleaner, and more reliable energy and help stave off the worst economic harms of climate change.

Let's be clear: Without domestic clean energy, we are looking at a vastly more expensive future. Renewable resources have near-zero marginal cost. They drive down the cost of electricity demand. States with more renewable resources do better heading off electricity price increases than States with fewer renewables.

And without domestic clean energy, we are looking at an energy future for America driven by Chinese innovation, Chinese industry, and Chinese power.

The global future of energy is clean. We are either part of it or we are left behind. Peak demand is expected to grow by 15 percent for summer peaks and 18 percent for winter peaks over the next 10 years, raising concerns about energy shortfalls.

What would reduce the risk of shortfalls? Better permitting, bringing more renewables onto the grid, building transmission lines. Instead, we are moving backwards, in the opposite direction.

Seventy percent of transmission lines are more than 25 years old, and they are showing their age. Last year, we managed to complete all of 322 miles of high-voltage transmission lines. It is the third slowest year in the past 15 years.

Thousands of electricity generation projects are waiting to connect to the grid. As of last April, they have added to 2.6 terawatts of power stalled for grid connections and millions of engineering, construction, and manufacturing jobs also stalled in part because of our inability to build the transmission lines for those connections.

We are entering a climate economic danger zone as climate upheaval hits property insurance markets and threatens to upend mortgage markets, which count on insurance, which threatens in turn to tank property values if you can't get mortgages, which could take down our whole economy. This is the path we are now on.

The Fed Chairman testified in the Banking Committee that in the next 10 to 15 years, there will be entire regions of our country where you can't get a mortgage anymore--entire regions.

Failing to permit and build the clean, modern grid we need isn't just foolish, it is dangerous. It helps put us on a path to climate and economic disaster.

Let's stop pretending fossil fuel giveaways are energy policies. Let's stop pretending that solar and wind are not energy. Let's stop revoking funds for transmission projects that we need. Let's stop acting like the clean, modern grid we need will build itself. Instead, let's build the clean energy future that brings down costs, creates jobs, and protects our communities, with the urgency this moment demands. And let's do it, Madam Chairman, together.

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