The Trump administration has announced what it terms “emergency permitting” for energy projects, streamlining a sometimes yearslong process down to 28 days. Opponents said it will mean time in court.
The U.S. Interior Department plans to alter the National Environmental Policy Act, Endangered Species Act and National Historic Preservation Act so projects around oil, gas, coal, minerals and more can proceed without the agency approvals the laws require. The department said it is part of President Donald Trump’s January “National Energy Emergency” declaration.
Erik Molvar, executive director of the Western Watersheds Project, argued there is no emergency.
“The idea that there’s some kind of ‘national energy emergency’ is a lie that the Trump administration is making up to justify an extralegal approach to approving energy projects and skipping past the environmental safeguards that Congress put in place,” Molvar contended.
He stressed the move risks historic sites, wildlife habitat and recreation opportunities on Wyoming’s public lands. Molvar added he expects energy projects brought under the new, streamlined permitting will be overturned in court.
The announcement came just one day after the Interior Department’s draft strategic plan for the next four years was leaked. A “big idea” cited in the draft is to “release federal holdings to allow state and local communities to reduce costs” and in parentheses, “housing.”
Molvar argued it would essentially put federal responsibilities in the hands of smaller entities.
“These state and local governments have a distinct tendency, particularly in conservative parts of the rural West, to want to maximize industrial development, maximize local communities’ abilities to line their own pockets, with really little consideration to the long-term health of the land,” Molvar asserted.
Strategic goals listed in the plan include to “restore American prosperity” and “ensure national security through infrastructure and innovation.”