The Federal Permitting Improvement Steering Council announced a new, “first-of-its-kind” Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the New Mexico Renewable Energy Transmission Authority (RETA).
The MOU establishes a working relationship between the Permitting Council and RETA in order to provide federal permitting support to RETA-supported projects that also qualify for coverage under the Permitting Council’s FAST-41 program. This new state-federal partnership will bring the tools and resources of the FAST-41 permitting assistance program to projects in New Mexico.
“The Permitting Council is excited to begin this new chapter of our relationship with New Mexico’s RETA as we work together to identify projects that could truly benefit from the FAST-41 permitting assistance program,” said Eric Beightel, Permitting Council Executive Director. “By bringing the vast tools of our program to the environmental review and authorization of infrastructure projects in the state of New Mexico, we know that we can realize a marked improvement in getting outstanding projects from the starting line to the finish with efficiency and effectiveness baked into every step of the process.”
The Permitting Council will bring the FAST-41 permitting assistance program to eligible RETA projects, which is meant to ensure an accountable federal environmental review and authorization process for those project sponsors that choose to join the FAST-41 program. Under the MOU, the Permitting Council will work with RETA on various aspects of the review process, including:
- Helping RETA to determine the FAST-41 eligibility of projects in RETA’s portfolio and providing ongoing support as RETA identifies new projects that may be eligible for permitting assistance;
- Engaging with developers of projects in RETA’s portfolio to provide FAST-41 briefings as requested;
- Coordinating with RETA to develop a FAST-41 Initiation Notice template that will support an efficient application process for developers of projects in RETA’s portfolio;
- Providing dedicated Permitting Council staff contacts for each covered project in RETA’s portfolio and supporting regular coordination calls with the project sponsor and the participating agencies for the project; and
- Convening, as appropriate, federal agencies with equities in RETA projects covered under FAST-41 to support timely issue identification, resolution, and efficient and effective environmental review and permitting of covered projects.
“RETA has been working on ways of expediting and streamlining the permitting process for several years,” said Robert Busch, RETA Board Chair. “This MOU with the Permitting Council is the next logical step in that effort. We look forward to finding ways of efficiently coordinating the federal and state permitting processes.”
As part of the MOU the Permitting Council will also work with RETA to identify projects that would benefit from FAST-41’s state opt-in provision. This provision allows the environmental reviews and authorizations of state agencies to be included on the federal Permitting Dashboard and held to the same statutory requirements of FAST-41 as though the state agencies were federal agencies. Those standards include permitting timetable posting, reporting, modification, and nonconformance requirements.
The Permitting Council coordinates federal environmental reviews and authorizations for projects that seek and qualify for FAST-41 coverage. FAST-41 covered projects are entitled to comprehensive permitting timetables and collaborative management of those timetables on the Federal Permitting Dashboard. FAST-41 covered projects may be in the renewable or conventional energy production, electricity transmission, energy storage, surface transportation, aviation, ports and waterways, water resource, broadband, pipelines, manufacturing, mining, carbon capture, semiconductors, artificial intelligence and machine learning, high-performance computing and advanced computer hardware and software, quantum information science and technology, data storage and data management, and cybersecurity sectors.
