{"id":92695,"date":"2019-07-31T00:10:47","date_gmt":"2019-07-31T00:10:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/bill-to-boost-renewable-energy-production-gains-bipartisan-support\/"},"modified":"2019-07-31T00:10:47","modified_gmt":"2019-07-31T00:10:47","slug":"bill-to-boost-renewable-energy-production-gains-bipartisan-support","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/bill-to-boost-renewable-energy-production-gains-bipartisan-support\/","title":{"rendered":"Bill to boost renewable energy production gains bipartisan support"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Tipton\"
Tipton<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

WASHINGTON \u2013 A bill aiming to increase renewable energy production on public lands is gaining broad support as it makes its way through the U.S. House.<\/p>\n

A bipartisan group of 24 lawmakers \u2013 including Rep. Scott Tipton, R-Cortez \u2013 introduced the Public Land Renewable Energy Development Act on July 17. It has since picked up nine more co-sponsorships and had a hearing in the House Natural Resources Committee.<\/p>\n

The proposed law would set up a revenue-sharing mechanism to split certain permitting and leasing fees from wind and solar energy developments on public lands between stakeholders. The state and county where the project takes place would each get 25% of the royalties, 25% would go to a new fund to conserve public lands for wildlife and recreation, 15% would be used to help process renewable energy permits and 10% would contribute to paying off the federal budget deficit.<\/p>\n

The bill would also establish an office to coordinate and speed up the sluggish permitting process for renewable energy projects. Applications for new geothermal, wind and solar energy developments can take more than a decade to gain approval, a member of the House Natural Resources Committee said.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the benefits we see in this legislation is to be able to replicate a little bit of what we see off of fossil fuel development, where royalties are paid back to the communities,\u201d Tipton said in an interview.<\/p>\n

Tipton praised the revenue-sharing system because he said it would incentivize state and county governments to welcome renewable energy developments on public lands. Governments could then invest their shares in public education and infrastructure projects, for instance, Tipton said.<\/p>\n

Chris Wood, president of cold-water fisheries conservation group Trout Unlimited, testified in favor of the bill in the House. Unlike the 1872 mining law, which did not dedicate funds to environmental protection, this bill takes conservation and outdoor recreation into account, Wood said.<\/p>\n

\u201cHunters and anglers really depend on (public) lands. I think what sportsmen like about this bill is the idea that it recognizes that we need to develop public lands in a responsible way with renewable energy,\u201d Wood said. \u201cBut we also need to provide for the restoration and conservation needs of fish and wildlife and water.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Public Land Renewable Energy Development Act of 2019 is the latest version of the bill, which was first introduced in 2011 by Sen. Jon Tester, a Democrat from Montana. Tipton and Colorado senators at the time, Democrats Michael Bennet and Mark Udall, co-sponsored that incarnation of the bill.<\/p>\n

Tracy Stone-Manning was on Tester\u2019s staff in 2011 and is now the associate vice president for public lands at the National Wildlife Federation. In a phone interview, Stone-Manning said it\u2019s high time Congress pass this common sense legislation, and she gave one suggestion to improve it.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat this bill doesn\u2019t consider \u2013 it\u2019s a small thing, but an important thing \u2013 we also have a bunch of federally owned public buildings all over this country that we could be putting solar panels on top of,\u201d Stone-Manning said.<\/p>\n

With 17 Republican co-sponsors and 16 Democratic ones, there is no visible opposition to the bill in Congress. When Tester first proposed it eight years ago, it also garnered support from both parties.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have no idea why it hasn\u2019t moved along. It\u2019s bipartisan,\u201d Stone-Manning said. \u201cIt is perhaps a reflection of priorities in Congress. It just needs to get more visibility and higher priority.\u201d<\/p>\n

James Marshall is a student at American University in Washington, D.C., and an intern for The Durango Herald.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Revenue-sharing approach speaks to proponents<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":92696,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5766,5738,5737,5736,5735,5741,6154,5765],"tags":[981,21,28,29,1426,23],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-92695","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-colorado-3rd-congressional-district","category-cortez","category-headlines","category-local-news","category-news","category-newsletter","category-renewable-energy","category-u-s-rep-scott-tipton","tag-colorado-3rd-congressional-district","tag-cortez","tag-headlines","tag-newsletter","tag-renewable-energy","tag-u-s-rep-scott-tipton"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92695","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=92695"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92695\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/92696"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92695"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92695"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92695"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=92695"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}