With President Trump announcing a concentrated push to repair and improving America’s infrastructure, we’re presented with a tremendous opportunity to encourage a significant expansion in our natural gas and oil infrastructure. The American Petroleum Institute has already come out in support of restructuring the regulatory and permitting processes in order to better facilitate investment in, and expansion of, our pipeline infrastructure.
The regulatory and permitting process has grown into a tangled mess in recent years, slowing down important projects that can revitalize communities and create thousands of jobs. Projects are often delayed for years – if not decades – simply waiting for different permits. This is, simply put, and unnecessary burden that is holding our infrastructure back.
As Jack Gerard, the head of the American Petroleum Institute told policymakers and reporters on Tuesday:
“By expanding our focus beyond traditional infrastructure conversation and considering the great opportunity of energy infrastructure investments, we could literally potentially double the economic benefits of infrastructure in this country as we now turn our attention to what we need to do to expand our resources and provide the infrastructure necessary.”
We can’t let this opportunity pass us by, and we must ensure that as President Trump’s massive infrastructure moves through the legislative process it includes an emphasis on this vital part of our nation’s infrastructure.