On Tuesday, the House of Representatives passed a package of bills to speed up permitting on federal lands for broadband infrastructure. But the package did not include the American Broadband Deployment Act, which would bring long-overdue permitting reform to building internet infrastructure.
Members of Congress have been talking about permitting reform for years. ABDA finally gives them a chance to follow through on this talk. They should not miss this opportunity to save taxpayer dollars, spur investment, and make the internet fast, better, and cheaper.
Energy infrastructure, housing, and factories and data centers have all been bogged down by federal environmental reviews, long waiting periods for state and local permits, and sometimes outright extortion by various levels of government. Wherever licenses, permits, or permission is required to build, bureaucrats can create long delays that increase costs.
ABDA, introduced by Rep. Buddy Carter (R-Ga.), includes several good ideas to bring permitting reform to broadband infrastructure. The Biden-era infrastructure bill created the $42.5 billion Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) program. Bureaucrats and local governments are salivating to get their hands on as many of these federal tax dollars as possible, regardless of how much they slow down internet infrastructure.
ABDA will help ensure that BEAD dollars are spent as efficiently and effectively as possible while permanently streamlining all future broadband buildout. The bill makes changes to three key areas: environmental reviews, timelines for permits, and access to rights-of-way.
Environmental Review
The centerpiece of the bill is its exemption of broadband deployment projects from most traditional environmental reviews. Under the current system, ISPs and wireless providers need to ask the EPA permission every time they want to remove or replace equipment at a cell tower or base station.
If this seems patently absurd, that’s because it is. Simple modifications to existing infrastructure, including upgrades to provide faster speeds or set the stage for network expansion, should not have to undergo months of study to see if the birds that hang out on the power lines will be affected. ABDA would exempt this general maintenance from National Environmental Policy Act reviews by specifying that they are not “major federal actions” under NEPA.
In addition to right-sizing the EPA, ABDA would preempt state and local environmental regulations for certain aspects of internet service. Radio waves, for example, carry most internet traffic through WiFi or 5G wireless service. The federal government has owned the airwaves since the Radio Act of 1927 and grants licenses to use it. ABDA leverages federal ownership to prohibit states and municipalities from claiming these vibrations have some sort of environmental impact they can regulate.
Shot Clocks
Too often, local and state governments have no legal reason to kill an infrastructure project they don’t like, so they weaponize the process to indefinitely delay building. Whether it’s local NIMBY opposition, angry labor unions that didn’t get the contract, or activists who think building anything will bring on the climate apocalypse, politicians can have any number of reasons to prevent broadband deployment that have nothing to do with the project’s merits. The temptation is to sit on applications and wait out the business looking to serve the local market until they get the concessions they want.
In other cases, counties and towns simply do not have the staff or IT systems to process applications in a timely manner. Whether through corruption or incompetence, too many infrastructure projects never get built due to delays in permitting.
ABDA imposes a much-needed shot clock of 90 days for local governments and their instrumentalities (such as public utilities) to grant “authorization to place, construct, or modify” facilities, as well as 150 days for all other requests. These timelines apply collectively to all requests for permits on a single project, so local authorities cannot stagger applications throughout the process to slow it down. Some applications can still be rejected under relevant local and state statutes, but they cannot be sat upon indefinitely when no legal reason to deny them exists.
This will ensure that projects can proceed irrespective of the pace of local government. Smaller, low-impact projects will likely be quickly green-lit, while time-consuming scrutiny will be reserved for more expansive projects that might actually warrant review under local regulations.
Rights-of-Way and Easements
Broadband infrastructure requires access to rights-of-way used by utility companies to reach their customers. To accelerate broadband buildout, access to easements needs to be simplified.
ABDA would allow projects to move forward if they don’t receive timely approval from federal agencies. Permits are deemed granted no more than 40 days after an initial application unless they are rejected. This will be a huge boost to broadband infrastructure that ensures the federal government does not stand in the way of its own $40 billion program.
The EPA, states, counties, and towns have all played their part in increasing infrastructure costs. ABDA will go a long way towards fixing this longstanding problem by getting government out of the way of progress.