PNNL

Improving the efficiency of the federal permitting process for energy infrastructure is a national priority. A streamlined permitting process will enable the Department of Energy to achieve its goals of expanding the nation’s energy infrastructure and increasing its domestic electricity generation. In the United States, expanding energy transmission and generation is critical to maintaining a reliable, affordable, and secure grid. Recent directives have set bold targets—such as adding 100 gigawatts of new electric capacity within five years. Meeting these goals requires not only new infrastructure but also efficient, predictable, and collaborative permitting processes at the federal, state, and tribal levels.

The Advanced Transmission and Generation Pathways (ATxP) initiative is a partnership between the Department of Energy’s Grid Deployment Office and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory to accelerate the path from energy project idea to reality by leveraging innovative artificial intelligence and collaborative expertise. 

Accelerating Energy Permitting

ATxP helps partners break through permitting bottlenecks and build resilient transmission and generation systems. Examples of this work include:

• Automate certain permitting processes for transmission and generation projects nationwide.
• Develop practical tools, resources, and guidance to simplify regulatory compliance for agencies and developers.
• Foster collaboration across federal, state, tribal, and local partners to create more predictable and efficient pathways for project review and approval.
• Share knowledge, data, and best practices to reduce risk and lower project costs.

To respond to the national priority to develop more energy infrastructure, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory created a suite of technical strategies in the following four areas:

• Advanced Technology (such as AI): Integrating tools like PermitAI into agency workflows, automating data analysis, and improving decision accuracy. Training and workflow redesign ensure staff can leverage these tools in everyday permitting.
• Programmatic Frameworks: Ready-to-use regulatory practices help agencies eliminate repetitive analysis and quickly meet core permitting requirements.
• Knowledge and Risk Hub: A national online reference library, plus new studies and technical memos, delivers fast access to benchmarks, guidance documents, and fresh research.
• Pathway Analysis and Assistance: Identify critical project pathways and provide standby technical assistance to equip partners to resolve urgent permitting challenges and keep projects moving forward.

Potential ATxP Partners

ATxP explores how energy developers, agencies, planners, and community partners can work together to maximize efficiency, transparency, and local benefits in energy infrastructure permitting.

• Government can use these strategies to administer permitting more efficiently through technology solutions, regulatory innovation, and first-in-class technical insights on effects and effective responses.
• Developers can use these strategies to have a clearer picture of permitting authorities and reduce development time, costs, and uncertainty through discovery and reliance on established federal science. 
• Permitting jurisdictions can use these strategies to execute permitting with the efficiency of new technologies, effective sharing between authorities, advanced programmatic approaches to regulation, and access to project effects, best practices, and technical studies.