考研英语阅读理解外刊原文经济学人

No one can doubt President Joe Biden’s commitment to clean energy. Unfortunately, his agenda faces a challenge rarely mentioned by climate activists: excessive regulation.
没有人能怀疑拜登（Joe Biden）总统对清洁能源的承诺。

不幸的是，他的议题面临着一个气候活动人士很少提及的挑战：过度监管。

A report from the National Academies of Sciences found that if the U.S. wants to reach net-zero emissions by midcentury, it will need to roughly double the share of electricity it produces from non-carbon sources by 2030. Reaching even that goal — which could well prove insufficient to the challenge — would require building wind and solar installations at a historically unprecedented pace.
国家科学院的一份报告发现，如果美国想要在本世纪中叶实现净零排放，那么到2030年，它需要将非碳源发电量的比例提高一倍左右。

即使要实现这一目标——很可能被证明不足以应对挑战——也需要以前所未有的速度建设风能和太阳能设施。

As things stand, that’s unlikely. There’s simply too much red tape.
就目前情况来看，这不太可能。

繁文缛节太多了。

Take the National Environmental Policy Act. Enacted in 1970, NEPA requires federal agencies to conduct environmental reviews for nearly every project that the government touches. Completing an impact statement under this process now takes four and a half years on average and can cost millions of dollars. Reviews can run for hundreds of pages. Lawsuits, often brought by activist groups, can extend the process interminably. Green projects aren’t immune from this burden: An analysis last year found that of the projects undergoing NEPA review at the Department of Energy, 42% concerned clean energy, transmission or environmental protection, while just 15% were related to fossil fuels.
以《国家环境政策法案》为例。

1970年颁布的《国家环境政策法案》要求联
邦机构对政府涉及的几乎每一个项目进行环境审查。

在这一过程中，完成一份影响报告现在需要四年半的时间，可能会花费数百万美元。

审查可以长达数百页。

诉讼——通常是由维权团体提出的——可能会无限期延长这一过程。

绿色项目也不能免于这种负担：去年的一项分析发现，在能源部接受《国家环境政策法案》审查的项目中，42%的项目与清洁能源、输电或环境保护有关，而只有15%的项目与化石燃料有关。

Across the renewables industry, such regulation — state and federal — is impeding progress. Wind power advocates complain of “unreasonable and unnecessary costs and long project delays.” Geothermal projects routinely face permitting hassles for seven to 10 years. Relicensing a hydropower plant can cost $50 million and take more than a decade. Solar projects often contend with a maze of permitting and certification requirements. Want to build a nuclear reactor? Compliance costs alone might exceed your profit margin.
在整个可再生能源行业，州和联邦的此类监管正在阻碍进展。

风能倡导者抱怨“不合理和不必要的成本及长期的项目延误”。

地热项目通常面临7到10年审批过程的麻烦。

重新审批一家水力发电厂可能需要5000万美元，而且需要10多年的时间。

太阳能项目经常面临错综复杂的审批和认证要求。

想要建造一个核反应堆？仅合规成本就可能超过你的利润率。

A similar story prevails with power transmission. Efficiently moving clean energy between regions is an essential component of the renewable economy; to reach net zero, that capacity needs to roughly triple by 2050. But thanks to an unholy patchwork of rules and regulations nationwide, transmission projects can easily require a decade to get off the ground.
电力传输也存在类似的情况。

高效地在地区之间转移清洁能源是可再生经济的一个重要组成部分；要实现净零排放，到2050年，这一产能需要增加大约两倍。

但由于全国各地的规章制度杂乱无章，输电项目很可能需要10年才能启动。

Such holdups are more than a nuisance. They waste tax dollars, raise construction
costs, delay capital productivity, impede private investment and all too often discourage ambitious new ideas. Worse, by delaying the switch to cleaner alternatives, they only add to total greenhouse-gas emissions. A government that views climate change as an “existential threat” — in the president’s words — can hardly tolerate such gridlock. Yet earlier this week, the Biden administration was busy adding to the morass of needless rules.
这样的耽搁不仅仅令人讨厌。

它们浪费税收、提高建设成本、推迟资本生产率、推迟私人投资，而且往往会阻碍雄心勃勃的新想法。

更糟糕的是，推迟向清洁能源的转变只会增加温室气体的总排放量。

用总统的话来说，一个将气候变化视为“生存威胁”的政府很难容忍这样的僵局。

然而，本周早些时候，拜登政府正忙于给这种困境增加不必要的规则。

Easy answers to this dilemma are elusive. Simply capping page counts or imposing time limits on environmental reviews, for instance, can actually lengthen the process — a review that’s incomplete or fails to anticipate potential objections is far more likely to draw lawsuits, and hence incur further delays.
这一困境的简单答案难以捉摸。

例如，简单地限制环境审查的页数或施加时间限制实际上会延长审查过程——一个不完整或未能预见潜在反对意见的审查更有可能引发诉讼，从而导致进一步的拖延。

Congress should think bigger. As a start, it should try to reduce the number of lawsuits brought under NEPA by shortening the statute of limitations for such cases to (say) 120 days, down from two years. Next, it should assert the power of the federal government. Passing the SITE Act — which would empower a single federal regulator to oversee big interstate transmission projects — could clear away decades of accumulated state and local veto points. Federal clean-energy funds could be conditioned on state reforms, such as streamlining reviews and reducing permit fees. When needed, Congress could impose limits on local ability to block green projects, much as it did for cell phone towers in the 1990s.
国会应该考虑更大的问题。

它应该将根据《国家环境政策法案》提起的诉讼的时效从2年缩短为（比如）120天，以努力减少诉讼。

其次，它应该维护联邦政府的权力。

通过SITE法案——该法案将授权一个联邦监管机构监督大型州际输电项目——这可能会清除州和地方数十年来累积的否决点。

联邦清洁能源基金可以视州改革而定，比如简化审查和降低许可证费用。

必要时，国会可以对当地阻挠绿色项目的力量施加限制，就像20世纪90年代对手机发射塔所做的那样。

Finally, lawmakers need to prioritize green energy across the board. Start approving new nuclear-reactor technologies. Get serious about a revenue-neutral carbon tax, which could obviate reams of additional rules. For a million reasons, repeal the Jones Act — not least because it’s impeding the development of offshore wind.
最后，立法者需要全面优先考虑绿色能源。

开始批准新的核反应堆技术。

认真对待收入中性的碳税，这可能会避免大量的额外规定。

废除《琼斯法案》有一百万个理由——尤其是因为它阻碍了海上风能的发展。

A zero-carbon economy will not materialize by magic. It will take immense effort, foresight and fresh thinking. A good place to start is this: When it comes to green energy, red tape is the enemy.
零碳经济不会神奇地实现。

这将需要巨大的努力、远见和新思维。

一个好的起点是：当谈到绿色能源时，繁文缛节就是敌人。