On November 4, NAED’s Director of Government Relations, Bud DeFlaviis, attended an event hosted by the Citizens for Responsible Energy Solutions (CRES).
The event, titled “Unleashing Alaska,” featured the state’s at-large member, Representative Nick Begich, and Larry Burton, Chief of Staff to Senator Dan Sullivan.
The event touched on recent Trump Administration efforts to unleash vast oil, gas, and mineral extraction in the state, and forward-looking efforts to craft durable policy by codifying permitting reform through efforts like the SPEED Act, which NAED supports. NAED and our channel partners support comprehensive permitting reform as a way to ensure economic growth and the ability for the private sector to make investments in new electricity generation and transmission buildout.
According to CRES, today’s permitting bottlenecks have been estimated to delay $1.5 trillion in projects that are awaiting final approval. Further, these delays are responsible for a 30% increase in construction costs for developments and $140 billion in lost annual revenue.
While the discussion was Alaska-centric, Congress and the Administration have rolled back many Biden-era regulations (like the Powder River Basin land use plan, the Ambler Road Project ban, and the Arctic protections effort). These efforts, combined with broad-based permitting reform, have the potential to have significant impacts on America’s capacity to extract more oil, natural gas, and minerals in the future.
Tagged with Alaska, government, NAED