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The federal permitting bill has been updated. What changed?
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The Senate’s bipartisan permitting bill got a manager’s amendment last week — 77 pages meant to answer objections from environmentalists, tribes, and utilities. Daniel Palken of Arnold Ventures returns to walk through what changed: narrower permit certainty provisions, a stronger transmission title, partial wins for tribes, and tighter rules making data centers pay. We also debate whether Democrats, fresh off a landslide, should take this deal or wait for a better one. We recorded Monday, hours before the Senate voted 73–25 to open debate.
Chapters:
00:00 – Introduction
02:19 – Where the bill stands: the cloture vote
05:55 – Politics 1: who’s for the bill and who’s against it
11:41 – Politics 2: why not wait for a better deal?
18:58 – Politics 3: affordability and the modeling
25:11 – Transmission 1: the planning fix for utilities
29:30 – Transmission 2: the backstop, FERC oversight and PJM
37:10 – Certainty 1: what changed in Section 1401
48:29 – Certainty 2: what’s left, plus 1402 and 1403
56:51 – Tribes 1: the Section 106 changes
1:05:58 – Tribes 2: the vacatur fight and where tribes land
1:11:35 – Data centers: making them pay their way
1:21:03 – Environment 1: ESA and the Clean Water Act
1:25:10 – Environment 2: NEPA and the state-NEPA test
1:31:18 – Odds and ends: nuclear, prescribed burns and more
1:34:57 – What Palken would change
1:38:32 – Politics 4: who moved, and Trump’s endorsement
1:44:15 – Politics 5: the House, and what happens if it dies
