AFPI Releases Brief on Permitting Reform for Energy Dominance

Washington, D.C. — The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) today released an issue brief, “Building Energy Dominance: A Near-Term Permitting Agenda.” 

The brief details how slow, costly government permitting holds back American building, and lays out four practical fixes—making routine projects easier to approve, holding agencies to firm deadlines, reining in lawsuits that drag projects out for years, and letting states handle more of the review—to help the country build energy and infrastructure faster without giving up real environmental protections. 

Key Findings

• Permitting delays act like a hidden tax—projects sit waiting for approvals for years, which drives up costs for builders, workers, and everyday families.
• Delays cost U.S. manufacturers at least $7.9 billion a year, and roughly $1.1–1.5 trillion in infrastructure projects is currently stuck in federal permitting.
• The biggest holdups hit the projects America needs most: mining takes 8–9 years on average, while pipelines, power generation, and transmission lines each take about 4–5 years.
• Lawsuits have become a second permitting system—activists file challenges mostly to cause delay, even though the government wins about 80% of these cases.
• Even fully approved projects can be killed by litigation. The Atlantic Coast Pipeline got its permits but was abandoned in 2020 after years of legal challenges, with costs nearly doubling to $8 billion.
• The rules were originally meant to protect the environment, but air quality has improved dramatically (a 79% drop in major pollutants over 50 years) even as the process has grown slower and more burdensome.

AFPI Policy Solutions

• Make routine work routine again—simplify approvals for repairs, upgrades, and modernizing existing facilities that don't create new environmental risks.
• Set firm, enforceable deadlines so agencies have to make timely decisions, with real consequences when they blow past those deadlines.
• Require agencies to ask for any missing information up front, in one request, instead of dragging things out with repeated demands.
• Rein in lawsuits by limiting who can sue, shortening the window to file, and fixing narrow legal problems without shutting down an entire project.
• Let states take the lead where they're equipped to handle the review, avoiding duplicate federal red tape—an approach that has already saved California up to 10 years on some projects.

The full issue brief is available here. 

AFPI experts are available for interview. For press inquiries, reach out to [email protected].