Studying Nepa's Impact on Projects Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. PANETTA. Mr. Speaker, I rise as a co-lead of the Studying NEPA's Impact on Projects Act.

As we have heard, this is a bill that would require the Council on Environmental Quality to provide annual reports that evaluate the efficiency and effectiveness of the Federal permitting process.

I thank Representative Yakym for his leadership on this issue and really appreciate his willingness to work in a bipartisan fashion to fix our government's permitting process. It is a process that, as we know, can be bogged down, burdensome, and brutally bureaucratic, leading to unnecessary delays that make it very difficult to increase affordable housing, improve our infrastructure, and advance important energy and transmission projects.

People in California's 19th Congressional District, as well as I am sure people in the Second District of Indiana and communities all across the country, have a great amount of concern and consternation as the permitting process is stunting their will and ability to reduce their carbon output, to solve the affordability crisis, and to decrease the damage from natural disasters.

Requiring an annual report is a commonsensical and practical way to use evidence to find the issue, fix the process, and affirm our energy and environmental values. It is a first step--we get that--but we know it is also a very big and impactful step so that, together, we can implement our efforts to protect our planet, increase clean energy options for our country, and reduce costs for communities.

Mr. Speaker, I urge my colleagues to vote ``aye.''

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