Input Stories

The White House Council on Environmental Quality’s Permitting Innovation Center launched its CE Works tool, a new pilot program aimed to speed up the environmental permitting process, this week.

How it works: “CE Works provides agencies with a digital pathway to apply categorical exclusions under [the National Environmental Policy Act]. Agency staff can use the platform to select an appropriate CE, collaborate among resource experts within the agency, route the determination for approval and generate a record for publication,” according to the White House.

• CEQ will work with the Bureau of Land Management’s Moab Field Office in Utah for its first field test of the tool, with other partnerships expected soon.
• “By leading agency field tests, CEQ is leveraging on-the-ground experience to advise agencies and promote the widespread adoption of digital solutions to bring speed and efficiency to the environmental review process,” the White House said.

The NAM says: “Our government must cut the red tape to speed up manufacturers’ ability to put shovels in the ground, and a modern permitting system needs modern technology,” said NAM President and CEO Jay Timmons.

• “The White House CEQ’s CE Works pilot program offers a promising path to modernize and accelerate federal environmental reviews—an important step to efficiently implementing the National Environmental Policy Act by quickly helping agencies identify cases where time-consuming reviews are not necessary.”
• “Reforming NEPA is a key manufacturing priority and a core pillar of the NAM’s ‘Manufacturing’s Roadmap to AI and Energy Dominance .’ This tool provides agencies with a digital pathway to apply categorical exclusions under NEPA, and increasing the use of CATEX under NEPA—as our roadmap states—will ensure that critical energy and infrastructure projects can advance without unnecessary delays through unnecessary reviews.”

Working with Congress: “Comprehensive, commonsense permitting reform must get done this year to provide certainty for manufacturers,” Timmons emphasized.

• We look forward to continuing to work with Congress  and the administration on commonsense priorities to improve the permitting process so America’s manufacturers can invest, grow jobs and compete on the global stage. We appreciate the White House CEQ for developing this innovative tool and taking this step toward meaningful permitting reform.”