Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Chair Shelley Moore Capito and ranking Democrat Sheldon Whitehouse are meeting to discuss reforming the federal energy permitting process, American Petroleum Institute president Mike Sommers told CNBC.
“We have both the Republican in the United States Senate ... Shelley Moore Capito, and the Democrat Sheldon Whitehouse, who [are] responsible for permitting reform, finally meeting again to discuss how we get this done this year,” Sommers told CNBC.
A person familiar with the negotiations, granted anonymity to discuss the details, said they “will be talking frequently this week about permitting since negotiations are back on,” but was unaware of any designated meeting time. The person noted committee staff are negotiating regularly.
Capito, R-W.V., and Whitehouse, D-R.I., talking regularly comes after Democrats publicly announced a thaw in permitting talks. Democrats walked away from talks last year after the Trump administration ordered work to stop on a slew of fully permitted offshore wind projects, but announced they would resume talks last week after “recent developments [that] are indicative of a positive direction from the Trump administration.”
