Bottleneck to Breakthrough/Permitting Blueprint to Build: National Petroleum Council Report

The National Petroleum Council’s (“NPC”) Committee on Oil and Natural Gas Infrastructure Permitting issued a December 3rd draft report titled:

Bottleneck to Breakthrough: A Permitting Blueprint to Build (“Report”).

NPC describes the Report as providing:

… practical solutions to modernize permitting and catalyze investment in America’s energy infrastructure.

The Report was prepared at the request of Secretary of Energy Chris Wright asking that the NPC undertake a Future Energy Systems study to provide advice on ensuring the availability of affordable, reliable, and secure energy for American consumers and allies. The request is stated to have specifically called for the delivery of a short-term study on streamlining and expediting oil and natural gas infrastructure permitting to meet future energy needs.

What are described as “focal points” of the permitting study include:

• Recent major economic and geopolitical developments affecting energy delivery and demand.
• Inefficiencies experienced under existing permitting laws, processes, and coordination efforts.
• Administrative and legislative reforms to accelerate approvals without compromising environmental protections.

What are described as systemic permitting barriers delaying timely approvals and hindering efficient construction of energy infrastructure are stated to include:

• Lengthy, fragmented reviews.
• Litigation-driven delays.
• Regulatory inconsistency.
• Capacity shortfalls.
• Infrastructure bottlenecks.

By way of summary of conclusions, the Report proposes what is described as a “two-pronged approach” that includes:

1. Immediate reforms to streamline existing processes, referencing clarification of National Environmental Policy Act reviews and reducing procedural delays.
2. Development of a new, standardized permitting framework for qualified projects.

The study team preparing the report is described as approximately 110 experts from over 40 organizations. Some of the participants are stated to have originated from outside of the oil and gas industry. 

NPC describes itself as an organization whose sole purpose it to provide advice to the federal government. There are about 200 NPC members which are appointed by the Department of Energy’s Secretary that include:

• All segments of the oil and natural gas industry.
• All segments of the country.
• Large and small companies.
• Personnel outside the oil and natural gas industry representing related interests such as large consumers, states, Native Americans, and academic, financial, research, and public-interest organizations and institutions.

A copy of the Report can be found here.