Oklahoma U.S. Sen. James Lankford has been busy in recent days writing a lot of letters of complaint about energy to the Biden administration.
His latest letter focuses on a proposed new rule by the Federal Permitting Improvement Steering Council in which the Senator contends it will hinder mining permitting and only help China. The letter was sent to Eric Beightel, Executive Director of the Council and demands the council rescind its proposal to limit the type of mining projects eligible for the improved permitting process established under Title 41 of the Fixing America’s Surface Transportation Act (FAST-41).
Lankford, joined by Senator Dan Sullivan (R-AK) and 20 Senators, wrote that the new rule would threaten America’s manufacturing, energy, infrastructure and national security needs “and further empower China’s near-monopoly on the global supply of critical minerals.”
The Senators wrote that permitting delays have been, and continued to be, one of the most significant risks to meeting domestsic mineral production goals.
“FPISC should be doing all it can to facilitate the addition of mining projects to the FPISC dashboard of covered projects, as significant investments are being made daily in such projects, regardless of the type of minerals being mined. Unfortunately, this misguided and shortsighted proposal disincentivizes such investment.”
The full text of the letter is available HERE