HR 7409: HEATS Act

HR 7409 in plain English: The HEATS Act would exempt certain geothermal energy exploration and production activities on state and private lands from federal drilling permit requirements, environmental review under NEPA, and endangered species consultation requirements, as long as the federal government owns less than 50% of the subsurface geothermal estate and the operator holds a state permit.

Stated purpose

The HEATS Act aims to remove federal permitting and environmental review requirements for geothermal energy exploration and production on state and private lands where the federal government owns less than half of the underground geothermal resource, in order to make it easier to develop geothermal energy on those lands.

Key points

• Removes the federal drilling permit requirement for geothermal projects on non-federal land where the U.S. owns less than 50% of the subsurface estate
• Exempts qualifying geothermal projects from federal environmental review under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA)
• Exempts qualifying projects from Endangered Species Act consultation requirements
• Exempts projects from federal historic preservation review if the state already has its own historic preservation law
• Does not apply to Indian lands

Arguments supporters make

• Geothermal energy is a clean, renewable power source, and cutting redundant federal red tape on private and state land speeds up its development without sacrificing state-level oversight.
• When the federal government owns less than half of the underground resource, requiring full federal permitting creates unnecessary bureaucratic delays that discourage investment in domestic clean energy.
• States already have their own permitting and environmental rules, so this bill trusts states to regulate activity on their own land rather than layering a second set of federal requirements on top.

Arguments opponents make

• Removing NEPA review and endangered species consultation means no federal check on potential environmental harms — such as water use, land disturbance, or impacts on protected wildlife — even when some federal ownership of the resource is involved.
• Geothermal drilling can affect shared underground resources and neighboring communities across property lines, so eliminating federal oversight could allow harms that cross boundaries a single state permit may not fully address.
• Historic and cultural sites near drilling areas would lose federal protection in any state that already has a historic preservation law, which covers most states, potentially leaving significant sites vulnerable without a consistent national standard.

Tradeoffs

Speeding up geothermal development by removing federal review layers trades away a uniform national floor of environmental, species, and historic preservation protections, shifting responsibility — and any resulting gaps — to individual states whose rules and enforcement capacity vary.

Current status in Congress: Passed House.

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