The Debt Ceiling Deal’s Energy Provisions, Explained

Last week’s debt ceiling deal let the U.S. avert an economic crisis. But it also modestly reformed federal permitting laws with an eye toward making it easier for private and public actors alike to build and deploy energy infrastructure.

“What you see is just the lowest-hanging fruit; it’s the least controversial stuff,” Alec Stapp, co-CEO of the Institute for Progress, tells The Dispatch. 

The fact that permitting reform made it into the bill at all is the latest example of bipartisan interest in hacking away at the red tape that routinely engangles a wide range of projects, from wind farms to natural gas...