Miles SmithThe White House’s Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) has unveiled a plan to modernize federal environmental review and permitting processes for major infrastructure projects.
The Permitting Technology Action Plan seeks to streamline procedures and enhance efficiency on projects that involve roads, bridges, mines, factories and power plants.
Elements of the plan include establishing minimum functional requirements for environmental review systems, permitting data and technology standards and outlining a timeline and implementation roadmap for agencies.
To support the plan’s implementation, the CEQ has established the Permitting Innovation Center, which will collaborate with the General Services Administration’s Technology Transformation Services to design and test prototype permitting technology systems and provide guidance to federal agencies on adopting advanced tools.
The plan also hopes to address several redundancies and systematic issues, including overreliance on systems, fragmented data management and disconnected digital tools, to improve transparency and predictability in environmental review and permitting schedules, according to the White House.
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