The Pennsylvania Environmental Protection Department is expanding its rationalizing permits for expansion and economic development (Speed) while also reporting a reduction of almost 98% in their permission delay since 2023.
Officials say that double effort is designed to accelerate the delivery of the project throughout the state without weakening environmental supervision. The Office of the Gov. Josh Shapiro (D) announced on August 20 that the speed is now applied to various types of permits beyond the approvals of Chapter 102 of the rainwater covered in the June launch.
The permit categories are now eligible for an accelerated review within the framework of the Pennsylvania speed program, including air quality, prey safety and stormwater approvals. Source: Pensilvania Environmental Protection Department.
The list now includes air quality, prey safety, waterways and wetlands and general and individual rainfall discharge permits.
“Shapiro’s administration is committed to moving at business speed and expanding the opportunities for Pennsylvania, without sacrificing environmental and public health protections that the Pennsilvans deserve,” said DEP secretary Jessica Shirley in a statement announced the expansion.
Within the framework of the program, applicants can hire qualified professionals approved by DEP to review the applications before arriving at the agency. The agency makes the final decision, but officials say that the process reduces the months outside the review process. A pilot race in 2024 reduced the review times for 30 to 40 working days in many cases, compared to the previous average of 176 days for rainwater permits.
The department reported in July that it reviewed about 20,000 permit applications for the first six months of this year, reducing the decline of more than 2,400 applications to less than 50.
The agency has also added 225 employees since 2023 and published digital tools, including a permit tracker launched in January 2025.
Although no projects have been publicly identified as a speed procedure, the administration has emphasized other efforts that illustrate its allowed thrust.
In the County of Dauphin, the new Hershey Co. chocolate processing facility. It opened this summer after accelerated approvals helped maintain their calendar. In Luzerne County, a major technological development known as the Hazelnut project advanced the initiative of the Governor’s fast permission separate permission.
State officials say that the speed aims to bring the same type of acceleration directly to the environmental reviews of the Department. Pennsylvania reforms reflect a national tendency.
In California, Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) signed the legislation in June by reviewing the State Environmental Quality Law, exempting the entire categories of long -reviewing housing and infrastructure projects.
Pennsylvania has adopted a different approach, maintaining the supervision of the department but delegated the initial reviews to revised professionals. Both strategies aim to streamline approvals, although the environmental groups of each state warn that the speed of reviews could erode protections and public transparency.
Pennsylvania Agency officials say they evaluate the results and expect to add more permit categories to accelerate by 2026. Shapiro administration leaders say that the program will improve the predictability for developers and contractors keeping environmental guarantees intact.
Enr requested additional data from the Department in medium processing time under speed and examples of specific projects that were allowed but had not received a response before press time.
