OPINION:
October marks the 50th anniversary of OPEC’s oil embargo of the West, an event that accelerated the 1973 oil crisis and set the stage for years of persistent inflation here in America. That anniversary will not be marked by an Oval Office ceremony or a parade down Pennsylvania Avenue. Instead, those old enough to remember will grimace at the thought of high prices and hours-long lines at gasoline stations.
Not everything Washington policymakers did back then to cope with the embargo worked. In fact, bad fiscal and monetary policy decisions layered into the global energy crisis, contributing to years of inflation.
This led to a lost economic decade for America.
But Washington did get one big thing right by enacting legislation to greenlight expedited construction of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System (TAPS). Passed by a Democratic Congress and signed by Republican President Richard Nixon, this ambitious pipeline infrastructure project remains one of the largest in our history and showed that America had the foresight and capability to do big things in divided government.
More recently, President Biden‘s approval of the Willow Project in Alaska was welcome news. But given the scale of energy supply challenges around the world, even bolder actions in Washington are needed and fast. We are again facing many of the same challenges posed a generation ago: chaotic international energy markets, crackling tension around the world and stubborn inflation right here at home.
It’s a lot to go up against. Can Americans again unite across party lines for the sake of our energy future?
Fortunately, the answer is yes. Washington policymakers have it firmly within their grasp to modernize our antiquated federal energy infrastructure approval process, put a down payment on our energy security, and unleash made-in-America energy.
First, let’s examine the status quo. The delays to get infrastructure projects permitted are inconsistent and extensive. Getting an infrastructure project through a National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) review just one hurdle among many that must be cleared now takes an average of 4.5 years. These routine delays, coupled with a host of other permits needed for a project, can discourage financial investments and subject sorely needed projects to sometimes frivolous litigation that can lead to their cancellation.
This is no way to do energy policy! But it gets worse. Fifty years ago, the U.S. leaned more heavily on foreign nations for access to energy. In the last two years, our own government is the obstacle at home.
Consider that, through the Biden administration’s first 19 months in office, the U.S. Interior Department (DOI) leased fewer acres for drilling on federal lands and waters than any other administration in its first 19 months since the end of World War II, when the U.S. economy was a tiny fraction of what it is today.
DOI has also been uneven in holding quarterly federal onshore lease sales, as required by federal law.
Meanwhile, we are waiting for DOI to issue a long-overdue, legally mandated, five-year leasing program to develop oil and natural gas via federal land and waters. Such development would help U.S. allies, too, with Russian energy blacklisted. As America again works to become the world’s biggest deliverer of liquefied natural gas (the U.S. supplied half of Europe’s LNG in 2022), we need all viable energy projects.
The good news is that Washington is set up for success. Modernizing requirements to obtain federal permits means quicker approvals and will enable the faster movement of energy where it is needed most. This will increase American energy supply, which could lead to reduced costs across the economy.
Permitting reform will also create good American jobs, as featured in a recent joint column I wrote with Sean McGarvey, leader of North America’s Building Trades Unions.
Last year, 46 Senators, including 38 Democrats, joined with their colleague, Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, to advance the public debate and focus on permitting reform. Though unsuccessful, the vote on his bill underscored growing momentum for these important reforms. Last month, the House approved its own permitting bill on a bipartisan basis, with four Democrats joining their Republican colleagues.
Under the right circumstances, the bipartisan work underway in Congress could serve as a helpful blueprint for enacting permitting modernization this year, especially as part of a broader debt limit and federal spending deal, an idea actively promoted across the ideological spectrum.
Turning the clock back to the beginning of this year, President Biden‘s omission of permitting reform in his State of the Union speech did not go unnoticed, even by Senate Majority Leader Schumer (D-NY). Yet compared to any policy his administration has advanced so far, supporting speedier energy permits would signal that Washington is ready and willing to unleash American energy.
Why would we outsource that job to unstable regimes? Do we really want to go back to the long filling-station lines of the 1970s when the solution is here in America?
America has changed the world through energy policies enacted during divided government, as TAPS and the 2015 lifting of export bans on crude oil proved. With good policies in place, there is hope the U.S. still can build big things and be a global energy leader in divided government.
• Mike Sommers is president and CEO of the American Petroleum Institute (API). API’s nearly 600 members produce, process and distribute most of the nation’s energy. The industry supports millions of U.S. jobs and is backed by a growing grassroots movement of millions of Americans.
Please read our comment policy before commenting.