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A conversation with Peter Bonner, senior fellow for the Federation of American Scientists
This week’s Q&A is with Peter Bonner, senior fellow for the Federation of American Scientists. I reached out to Peter because this week, as I was breaking stories about chaos in renewables permitting, his organization released a report he helped author that details how technology and hiring challenges are real bottlenecks in the federal environmental review process. We talked about this report, which was the culmination of 18 months of research and involved detailed interviews with federal permitting staff.
The following interview was lightly edited for clarity.
Okay so walk me through why you did this report.
The reason for doing the report was to look at, why is permitting a bottleneck? What are some things that can improve the effectiveness and the efficiency of permitting to get permits done better and faster?
Depending on the type of permitting project and where the infrastructure is getting built, permitting could be very, very difficult, or it could go more easily. It depends on the number of stakeholders involved. It depends on the type of permitting project it is. But it also depends on each agency doing permitting somewhat differently, and leaning on different types of technology to enable them to do permitting better.
One agency may have one configuration of a permitting team and in another agency, that configuration of a permitting team may be quite different, sometimes independent of the type of permitting project they’re talking about. So there’s a need for greater consistency in how those teams are built, and also the skill and talent that goes into those teams and how they work with contractors to get the permits done.
In addition, each agency is leaning on their own types of technologies on case management and how to run the permitting project instead of there being consistency around the technologies they use as well.
What went into this report?
There were a couple pieces to it. One is a set of pretty extensive interviews with permitting program managers, hiring managers, and HR specialists who were bringing people into agencies to help with permitting functions and programs. We also did significant extensive research into the permitting process and what technologies permitting teams were using to document and guide their work in adherence to regulations. So a lot of it was primary research working directly with the agencies and the people who were on the ground doing the permitting.
How much of the backlog in permitting is Congress? Or is it just the executive branch?
Clarity in the laws and regulations that guide permitting – there’s still work there to be done. But our focus was less on laws and regulations and more around, how are permitting teams actually getting the work done? What talent do they need on those teams? What technologies can they use to support their work?
So you’re telling me a big issue might really be the government’s load bearing infrastructure, so to speak. Is it really just the back-end? The pipes?
A decent amount of it is the pipes and getting the right people in place.
The permitting workforce has been wanting for people and skillsets even before the increase in infrastructure spending over the past few years. You’re looking at a workforce that did not have enough people to do the job before this influx of projects came in.
It therefore depended on bringing in people and contracting people to do that work as well. And in the hiring process, we found significant delays in recruiting for permitting talent..
What we found was a lot of delays due to the bureaucracy around hiring that I think is well-documented in other places [in government]. Doing more, clear skills-based assessments up-front when you’re evaluating people for jobs so that highly qualified people then make it to the list that you can hire from. Making sure people get through the background check process properly. There’s lots of things that delay getting people on board faster and also reaching out and recruiting the right sorts of folks.
To what extent do you think your recommendations here on the pipes, so to speak, will have an audience with this administration? I’m particularly curious given all the headlines we’re seeing about staff reductions in the federal government.
It’s hard to project that and there’s a lot of clarity that needs still to come in terms of how this administration is viewing supporting permitting teams and the agencies to make sure that they can do their jobs better. The real answers to that are still to come.
I think there’s a lot of change going on in the permitting regulatory environment, the regulations. There’s also executive orders, legal decisions that have come down lately. We’re in a dynamic, changing situation.
My hope is that the administration would recognize that, take a look at the report we have and take a look at investing in the right people and the right technologies.
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Plus, what a Texas energy veteran thinks is behind the surprising turn against solar and wind.
I couldn’t have a single conversation with a developer this week without talking about Texas.
In case you’re unaware, the Texas Senate two days ago passed legislation — SB 819 — that would require all solar and wind projects over 10 megawatts to receive a certification from the state Public Utilities Commission — a process fossil fuel generation doesn’t have to go through. The bill, which one renewables group CEO testified would “kill” the industry in Texas, was approved by the legislature’s GOP majority despite a large number of landowners and ranchers testifying against the bill, an ongoing solar and wind boom in the state, and a need to quickly provide energy to Texas’ growing number of data centers and battery manufacturing facilities.
But that’s not all: On the same day, the Texas Senate Business and Commerce Committee approved a bill — SB 715 — that would target solar and wind by requiring generation facilities to be able to produce power whenever called upon by grid operators or otherwise pay a fine. Critics of the bill, which as written does not differentiate between new and existing facilities, say it could constrain the growth of Texas’ energy grid, not to mention impose penalties on solar and wind facilities that lack sufficient energy storage on site.
Renewable energy trades are in freak-out mode, mobilizing to try and scuttlebutt bills that could stifle what otherwise would be a perfect state for the sector. As we’ve previously explained, a big reason why Texas is so good for development is because, despite its ruby red nature, there is scant regulation letting towns or counties get in the way of energy development generally.
Seeking to best understand why anti-renewables bills are sailing through the Lone Star State, I phoned Doug Lewin, a Texas energy sector veteran, on the morning of the votes in the Texas Senate. Lewin said he believes that unlike other circumstances we’ve written about, like Oklahoma and Arizona, there really isn’t a groundswell of Texans against renewable energy development. This aligns with our data in Heatmap Pro, which shows 76% of counties being more welcoming than average to a utility-scale wind or solar farm. This is seen even in the author of the 24/7 power bill – state Senator Kevin Sparks – who represents the city of Midland, which is in a county that Heatmap Pro modeling indicates has a low risk of opposition. The Midland area is home to several wind and solar projects; German renewables giant RWE last month announced it would expand into the county to power oil and gas extraction with renewables.
But Lewin told me there’s another factor: He believes the legislation is largely motivated by legislators’ conservative voters suffering from a “misinformation” and “algorithm” problem. It’s their information diets, he believes, which are producing fears about the environmental impacts of developing renewable energy.
“He’s actively working against the interests of his district,” Lewin said of Sparks. “It’s algorithms. I don’t know what folks think is going on. People are just getting a lot of bad information.”
One prominent example came from a hailstorm during Hurricane Uri last year. Ice rocks described like golfballs rained down upon south-east Texas, striking, among other things, a utility-scale solar farm called Fighting Jays overseen by Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners. The incident went viral on Facebook and was seized upon by large conservative advocacy organizations including the Competitive Enterprise Institute.
What’s next? Honestly, the only thing standing between these bills and becoming law is a sliver of hope in the renewables world that the millions of dollars flowing into Texas House members’ districts via project investments and tax benefits outweigh the conservative cultural animus against their product. But if the past is prologue, things aren’t looking great.
And more of the week’s most important conflicts around renewable energy.
1. Westchester County, N.Y. – Residents in Yonkers are pressuring city officials to renew a moratorium on battery storage before it expires in July.
2. Atlantic County, New Jersey – Sorry Atlantic Shores, but you’re not getting your EPA permit back.
3. St Clair County, Michigan – We may soon have what appears to be the first-ever county health regulations targeting renewable energy.
4. Freeborn County, Minnesota – Officials in this county have rejected a Midwater Energy Storage battery storage project citing concerns about fires.
5. Little River County, Arkansas – A petition circulating in this county would put the tax abatement for a NextEra solar project up for a vote county-wide.
6. Van Zandt County, Texas – Officials in this county have reportedly succeeded in getting a court to impose a restraining order against Taaleri Energy to halt the Amador battery storage project.
7. Gillespie County, Texas – Peregrine Energy’s battery storage proposal in the rural town of Harper is also facing a mounting local outcry.
8. Churchill County, Nevada – Battery storage might be good for Nevada mining, but we have what appears to be our first sign of revolt against the technology in the state.
A conversation with Mike Barnwell of the Michigan Regional Council of Carpenters and Millwrights
Today’s conversation is with Mike Barnwell at the Michigan Regional Council of Carpenters and Millwrights, a union organization more than 14,000 members strong. I reached out to Barnwell because I’d been trying to better understand the role labor unions could play in influencing renewables policy decisions, from the labor permitting office to the fate of the Inflation Reduction Act. So I called him up on my way home from the American Clean Power Association’s permitting conference in Seattle, where I gave a talk, and we chatted about how much I love Coney Island chili in Detroit. Oh, and renewable energy, of course.
The following conversation has been lightly edited for clarity.
I guess to start, we covered Michigan’s new permitting and siting law. What role did your union play in that process?
Locally, with the siting laws, we were a big part of that from the local level all the way to the state. From speaking at the Capitol down to city council and building authority meetings about projects happening in areas and cleaning out some of the red tape to make these possible.
It’s created jobs for our members current and future.
So you see labor as being helpful in getting permitting done faster?
Being labor maybe I’m biased but I think it is. I say labor collectively, we’ve got a pretty good coalition here in Michigan.
Do you think unions like yours will be similarly influential in the future of the Inflation Reduction Act back in Washington, D.C.?
Let me put it this way: the requirements of registered apprenticeships being on site come back to creating jobs for our members. Otherwise it’s just hiring anybody off the street – unskilled and unsafe workplaces. We train our folks through our apprenticeships and that legislation is ensuring safety on the jobs for one, let alone letting them build careers and pensions.
We’re a carpenter-centric union but this all falls under the work of what we do. We’ve been implementing our four-year apprenticeship program — every kind of renewable energy training you can think of, we’ve implemented it into our programs. It’s hands on. We have mockups at our training centers where [projects] get built and torn down and built and torn down. When you talk about a utility-scale solar project, it’s an average of 160-170 individuals working on that project. Without proper skills training they can’t work in coordination with each other.
How are you feeling about the future of the tax credits?
Uneasy.
The current leadership, they obviously have different views than the past leadership did. Lookit – when you talk about the IRA that has done nothing but create jobs for the blue collar working man in not just our state but around the nation. Here in Michigan, it almost went from zero to sixty in 10 seconds. It was miraculous what they did for us. We went from scratching and clawing in trying to procure these projects to now the IRA requiring skill training and prevailing wage and benefits and health care, which what as a union we’re all about.
Just in the last year, we’ve brought on over 300 new members just for solar alone. That’s all because of the federal tax credit and the language in the IRA.
Last question – what role do you see labor playing in the process of getting individual projects permitted and built?
Our role in that, I’ve been to plenty of these community meetings myself but it’s the actual working guy, the guy who is using his tools every week, who goes and speaks up to their county or town leadership about the benefits of these projects.
That big BlueOval battery plant in Marshall, Michigan – I don’t know if that would’ve been permitted without the work of our members being at those meetings, letting their voices be heard. There was obviously an opposition voice as well, but ours were a bit louder in the room. People want to hear the voices that say yes we want it and here’s why. This is how I support my family from the work on these projects. Otherwise it would’ve never gotten off the ground.