We’re hitting new records every week in Michigan.

But those aren’t the kind of records we want to be reaching.

It shouldn’t break the bank to fill up your gas tank, and, yet, gas prices have passed $5 per gallon.

Too many families are suddenly struggling just to fill the tank to get to work.

Those sky-high gas prices are exactly what critics of safe energy access have been pushing for, and, if they got their way, they’d only fly higher. Critics continue their crusade to shut down the already-safe Line 5 pipeline that delivers 540,000 barrels per day of the fuel we use to gas up our cars, power our equipment and run our businesses.

Critics bizarrely oppose the obvious solution — moving a portion of the safe pipeline out of the water in the Straits of Mackinac and putting it deep underground in the state-of-the-art Great Lakes Tunnel.

There’s good news, though. Permitting agencies at both the state and federal level this summer have a chance to protect your pocketbook by approving the permits needed to begin construction on the tunnel. We’re encouraging them to seize those opportunities without delay.

Critics’ only solution is less fuel — during the most serious energy crisis of our lifetimes.

Let’s not mince words — that’d cost an arm and a leg.

In fact, according to the latest numbers from the nonpartisan Consumer Energy Alliance, without Line 5, the state would pay up to $2 billion more per year for fuel. Across the Midwest, those costs could eclipse $29 billion in higher fuel prices over the next five years alone.

Think you’re paying too much at the pump today?

The price at the pump is only one impact Michigan would feel without the tunnel, though.

Our state depends on Line 5 for jobs. We depend on it in the energy industry. Manufacturers rely on it. The chemistry industry depends on that fuel.

Line 5 means jobs. Great jobs. Building the tunnel means growing and protecting those jobs. Tens of thousands of them.

It’ll protect the Great Lakes and our environment, too.

The great news is that the vast majority of Michiganders — Democrats and Republicans — already back the common-sense solution in the works to make the already safe pipeline even safer. Lawmakers have already stood together to back a bipartisan plan to build the Great Lakes Tunnel.

Now it’s up to permitting agencies to give the go-ahead to start construction.

This summer, the permitting process for the Great Lakes Tunnel takes center stage. Although permits were already approved by the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy, key approvals from the Michigan Public Service Commission and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers are in the works now.

Every day that goes by without advancing the Great Lakes Tunnel is a wasted opportunity to ensure our energy affordability and reliability while protecting our jobs and the Great Lakes at the same time.

We’re standing with labor leaders, business organizations, families, and employers to ask regulators to fast-track those permits and move the Great Lakes Tunnel construction process forward.

Michigan needs Line 5 and we need the Great Lakes Tunnel.

It’s time for opponents to end the stall tactics.

It’s time to grant the permits.

Derek Dalling is executive director of Michigan Propane Gas Association and a leader of the Great Lakes Michigan Jobs Coalition.