the european union outlined proposals wednesday to cut red tape for renewableenergy projects and speed up its transition away from fossil fuels part of a rush to end a reliance on russian energy supplies the european commission the eus executive arm published a proposal that seeks to cut lengthy planning permissionrelated delays that have held back the continents drive toward renewables the commission said the temporary proposals which will be in place for one year would assume new renewableenergy projects were of overriding public interest and simplify the process of carrying out environmental impact assessments certain projectssolar energy heat pumps and efforts to expand existing renewableenergy plantswould see caps set on their wait for permits solar projects would wait no more than one month for permits while heat pumps and projects to expand existing renewableenergy plants would see their wait for permits capped at three months and six months respectively the commission said it chose those three types of projects because they presented the easiest routes to rapidly rolling out new renewableenergy sources these steps are the latest effort in the eus push to cut its dependence on russian fossil fuels moscows strangling of the continents naturalgas supplies following its invasion of ukraine and western sanctions targeting russias oil exports have sent european energy and electricity prices surging forcing governments to spend heavily on bailing out utility firms and subsidizing household energy bills the worsening over the summer of the energy supply and price shocks spurred by russias invasion of ukraine have made the need to accelerate the deployment of renewable energy across the eu even more urgent the commission said write to will horner at williamhornerwsjcom