The House approved the Geothermal Energy Advancement Act on Tuesday afternoon, sending a bipartisan permitting-reform package to the Senate that would force the Interior Department to process geothermal project applications within 60 days and carve out exemptions from a 55-year-old environmental review law that critics say has strangled domestic energy development.
The bill passed by voice vote, meaning no recorded opposition, in a chamber that can rarely agree on what day it is. That alone tells you something about where geothermal energy sits on the political map: squarely in the overlap between Republicans who want faster permitting and cheaper electricity, and Democrats who want to expand sources of power that don't burn fossil fuels.
Whether the Senate acts before the August recess is another question entirely. And whether the broader permitting-reform debate consuming Capitol Hill will produce anything beyond press releases remains an open bet.
The Geothermal Energy Advancement Act, first introduced by Rep. Jeff Hurd, a Colorado Republican, bundles provisions from several Republican- and Democratic-authored bills into a single legislative package. Its core mechanisms are built around one number: 60 days.
Interior Secretary Doug Burgum would be required to appoint a geothermal ombudsman within 60 days of enactment. That ombudsman would serve as a liaison among officials and offices within the Bureau of Land Management to streamline permitting for geothermal projects. Burgum would also have to stand up a geothermal permitting task force, again, within 60 days, to support the ombudsman's work.
Most consequentially, the bill would require the Interior secretary to process applications for geothermal-related projects, leasing, drilling permits, and other authorizations, within 60 days. That provision originated in a separate bill introduced by Rep. Celeste Maloy, a Utah Republican, and was folded into Hurd's package during the amendment process.
A provision from Rep. Susie Lee, a Nevada Democrat, was also added. It would expand a categorical exclusion from National Environmental Policy Act requirements for certain geothermal projects, effectively allowing some developments to bypass the full-blown environmental review process that NEPA demands.
NEPA, signed into law more than five decades ago, requires federal agencies to assess the environmental impact of major projects before granting permits. In theory, it ensures the government looks before it leaps. In practice, it has become a litigation magnet and a bureaucratic bottleneck that can delay energy projects for years.
Geothermal projects have been described as hamstrung by lengthy environmental reviews, court challenges, and bureaucratic red tape, obstacles that impose costly delays and, according to supporters of the bill, prevent geothermal energy from becoming commercially viable in American markets.
That is a problem worth understanding. Geothermal energy, heat drawn from deep within the Earth, has been used for hundreds of years in regions like Iceland and New Zealand. Modern hydraulic fracturing techniques now allow developers to target that internal heat several miles underground, opening up far more geography to geothermal development than the natural hot springs and volcanic zones that once defined the industry.
Geothermal carries an estimated capacity factor of 65 percent. The Energy Department defines capacity factor as "the amount of electricity a generator can produce when it's running at full blast." For context, that figure puts geothermal well above wind and solar in terms of reliability, it generates power around the clock, regardless of weather.
And yet federal permitting requirements have kept this energy source from scaling. The bill's supporters argue that if the government can't process a drilling permit in less than several years, no private company will risk the capital.
The voice vote signals genuine cross-aisle support, a rarity in a Congress where even naming a post office can turn partisan. The bill's architecture, Republican-authored core, Democratic provisions grafted in, reflects the kind of dealmaking that used to be routine on Capitol Hill.
But the Senate is a different animal. Lawmakers in both parties have spent months debating broader legislation to streamline and accelerate the federal permitting process for energy and infrastructure projects. The House passed a separate NEPA reform and permitting modernization bill last December. The Senate, however, has not released any text of its own version.
In recent weeks, Republicans and Democrats in the upper chamber have both indicated that progress is being made on a deal. Time, though, is short. Congress faces an August recess deadline, and the Senate's track record on moving quickly is not encouraging.
Complicating matters further, Senate Democrats have raised concerns that the Trump administration would not fairly implement permitting reforms on renewable energy projects such as wind and solar. That skepticism, whether grounded or strategic, could slow or block the geothermal bill's path even though it passed the House without a single audible objection.
It is worth noting that Democrats have a long history of shifting positions when political winds change. Whether Senate Democrats will embrace a bipartisan energy bill or use it as leverage in the broader permitting fight remains to be seen.
Energy and electricity prices have been surging. American families and businesses are paying more to keep the lights on, and the federal government's own permitting apparatus is one reason new supply isn't coming online fast enough. Every month a geothermal project sits in a review queue is a month that electricity consumers don't benefit from a reliable, domestically produced power source.
Geothermal is not a moonshot. It is proven technology, used commercially for decades overseas, with a reliability profile that dwarfs intermittent sources like wind and solar. The obstacle is not engineering. It is paperwork.
The Geothermal Energy Advancement Act does not abolish NEPA. It does not eliminate environmental review. It creates a dedicated ombudsman, a task force, hard deadlines, and targeted categorical exclusions, the kind of focused, practical reforms that strip away bureaucratic drag without gutting environmental law.
If that sounds like common sense, it is. The question is whether common sense can survive the Senate.
The bill now moves to the upper chamber, where its fate is tangled up in the larger permitting-reform negotiations. Senators from energy-producing states in both parties have reason to support it. But the broader debate over NEPA reform, renewable energy implementation, and executive branch authority could easily swallow a targeted geothermal bill whole.
The House did its part. Members from Colorado, Utah, and Nevada, states with direct stakes in geothermal development, built a package that drew no opposition on the floor. The legislative text is specific, the deadlines are real, and the mechanisms are designed to produce results, not just headlines.
Now it falls to the Senate to decide whether cutting red tape for American energy is worth the effort, or whether another promising reform will die quietly in a committee room while electricity bills keep climbing.
Washington rarely misses a chance to miss a chance. Geothermal energy has waited long enough.