Another important project, this time in Western Pennsylvania, is being delayed and subsequently seeing its cost projections rise by our ungainly permitting process.

Grants for the project were announced in 2019 — about four years ago. The project, a hydroelectric plant in Braddock, would also reduce dependence on fossil fuels with a renewable energy source that itself is not dependent on battery technology.

We’ve written before about the burden our cumbersome, overly bureaucratic permitting processes place on American families and businesses. We remain stalwart advocates of reform, of finding ways of speeding up reviews and granting of permits so projects that can improve our nation’s and our state’s infrastructure can move forward.

We’ve specifically noted that this unwieldy permitting process is also an obstacle to renewable energy — as it is once again in Braddock.

We would hope that this instance would be able to bring people on all sides of the important questions about where we get our energy together, to support a part of the solution on which we all should be able to agree.

And yet, we must bemoan the lack of urgency on the part of state and federal officials to clarify and streamline permitting for essential projects.

America’s businesses and homes need energy. And they need a government that serves the public interest, rather than a bureaucracy that stymies necessary development.