Editor's Note: Plans change quickly when you're unexpectedly out sick. Rather than letting these issues go on autopilot, I spent recovery time rebuilding search routines and improving some Ghost workflows. Time will tell if the changes stick. Back to the regularly scheduled programming. The newsletter paused
Editorial note: Some weeks I don't find enough to justify an email. The overlap between tech and policy keeps getting richer, and that's what makes this space interesting, but I want to keep this newsletter tethered to tech. There are other places to follow the policy
AI
Seattle launched a citywide AI permitting reform initiative under a mayoral executive order, becoming the second major city to build its workflow around CivCheck, a product that changed corporate hands last year. HUD is offering $3 million for jurisdictions willing to deploy automated permitting systems, with applications due in one
The EPA proposed sweeping NEPA reforms with hard deadlines on June 25, issued a new Section 309 comment-letter memorandum, and closed the comment period on its New Source Review pre-permit construction rule this week. USDA's consolidated NEPA rule reaches its first EIS milestone on July 2.
Three days after launch, the US government ordered Anthropic to pull its two most powerful models, raising a procurement risk the permitting tech industry hasn't had to reckon with before. Also this week: the Permitting Council put $14 million behind three federal agency AI projects, Florida's
AI
Trump signed the administration's AI executive order June 2, replacing mandatory oversight with voluntary frameworks. EPA proposed letting data center developers break ground before receiving an air permit. In San Francisco, the fight over the OpenGov contract renewal reached the Civil Service Commission. Trump signs AI executive order
CoStar
This is an AI-flavored edition, because the week's biggest permitting-tech stories are all the same story. CoStar paid $800 million for a development-data platform built on public records. The records boom burying local clerks turns out to be the AI industry feeding itself. And GovWell
Tracking investment, products, and policy in permitting technology.
Everyone in permitting is talking about the value of data. Open datasets, AI-ready records, the dashboard that finally shows the whole pipeline. Almost nobody asks the first question: where the data is coming from? The permits themselves are public records, so that part is free. Turning a county'
Trump pulled the AI executive order off the table. Florida's AI permitting experiments are spreading county by county. And the governors just told Congress what permitting reform should actually look like. [Editor's Note: I hope everyone got a chance to recharge their batteries over the Memorial
Two parallel waves of consolidation are running through permitting technology right now. If you build, buy, or regulate these tools, it's worth paying attention. On the consulting side, PE-backed roll-ups and aggressive acquirers are absorbing specialty environmental firms. True Environmental, Apex, and Langan have grown through
Publishing before the long weekend and the importance of the GovWell deal. GovWell just raised $25 million. DOE is hosting commercialization webinars for its NEPA AI tools. And the CEQ Permitting Innovators deadline is two weeks out. GovWell raises $25M Series A from Insight Partners GovWell closed a $25M Series
EPA proposed redefining when construction can begin. Louisville hired its first Chief AI Officer. And the ePermit Act keeps picking up sponsors. EPA proposes New Source Review permit reform EPA proposed revisions to the Clean Air Act New Source Review program on May 13. The rule would let project sponsors
I spent last week enjoying the fresh air, abundant sunlight, and the company of some fine folks in Anchorage at the National Association of Environmental Professionals conference. The conference brings together an array of attendees who care about environmental reviews: agency staff, consultants, technologists, and more. I came with lots
May 11th, 2026 AI in permitting just crossed into new territory. Not because of a product launch or a funding round, but because of two governance signals that arrived in the same week. First: GL Solutions' 2026 state-by-state assessments report that AI has replaced cybersecurity as the
EPA built a tool that answers the question every applicant asks first: who do I call? EPA launches interactive Permitting Authority Map EPA released an interactive map on May 6 that identifies which regulatory body — EPA, state, local, or tribal — holds permitting authority across all of EPA's programs
CEQ's CE Works has its first live agency pilot. New Jersey is launching a public permitting dashboard. And geothermal just got eight bipartisan bills through committee. CE Works starts first pilot at BLM Moab CEQ's CE Works platform — the tool that digitizes categorical exclusion determinations — has
April 27th, 2026 For the past two years, AI in permitting has been a collection of pilot projects and vendor demos. That changed this month. The Environmental Council of the States published data from 21 state environmental agencies on AI adoption. Route Fifty documented the shift from experimental to operational
The ePermit Act landed in the Senate with eight co-sponsors. EPA is studying its own AI use in permitting decisions. And states are starting to mandate digital permitting by law. ePermit Act introduced in the Senate Eight senators — Curtis, Booker, McCormick, Kelly, Daines, Hickenlooper, Budd, and Padilla — introduced S.
CEQ is building a vendor expo for permitting technology. EPA now has 29 AI use cases. And for the first time in 20 years, AI has bumped cybersecurity off the top of state CIO priority lists. CEQ announces Permitting Innovators program and vendor expo CEQ's Permitting Innovation Center,