U.S. Rep. Doug Lamborn of Colorado Springs says hydropower generated from water pumped back uphill and released again is the wave of the future for clean energy in the West.

His bill, the Bureau of Reclamation Pumped Storage Hydropower Development Act, cleared the U.S. House on a voice vote last week. If it passes the Senate, it could clear up some red tape over who is in charge of the permitting where the Bureau of Reclamation and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission have overlapping jurisdiction.

“It creates confusion, expense and delay, and basically projects can’t get built under those conditions,” Lamborn said.

Lamborn’s bill says if there’s a conflict, BOR by default is in charge of permits.

“It vastly simplifies the red tape and bureaucracy,” Lamborn said.

The ultimate goal is to make hydropower for Colorado and the entire West more available.

“Everyone loves or show love hydropower. There no emissions. It’s clean. It’s renewable the West has a number of reservoirs already in place,” Lamborn said.

Bart Miller, the Healthy Rivers program director for the Boulder-based conservation policy center Western Resource Advocates, said hydropower should be in the mix, but it has a lot of drawbacks that Lamborn’s bill won’t fix.

“It’s no slam dunk that taking jurisdiction away from the FERC will speed things up,” Miller said in an e-mail exchange. “There are many other reasons for the small number of pump-back storage projects out there: limited locations, high construction costs, impacts to rivers and reliance on fuels to pump water up.

“Shouldn’t be off-the-table for discussion, but energy efficiency and other forms of renewable energy have a strong track record for providing low-cost energy that keeps our air clean.”

The Bureau of Reclamation currently has 14 power plants and 60 dams in Colorado.

“If we make it easier to do hydropower … then Colorado could be a lot more productive generating hydropower,” Lamborn told Colorado Politics.