The Environmental Protection Agency is proposing revoking Obama-era regulations on climate-changing methane leaks from many oil facilities, a move that environmental groups say is meant to renounce the agency’s overall legal authority to regulate the gas in the fight against global warming.
EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler says the proposed rule follows US President Donald Trump’s directions to remove “unnecessary and duplicative regulatory burdens from the oil and gas industry.”
An illustrative photo of an oil pump (Photo credit: Shutterstock images)
The step will be the latest in a series easing the previous administration’s emissions controls on the oil, gas and coal industries, including a 2016 rule regulating oil-industry methane leaks as a pollutant under the federal Clean Air Act.
Methane is a component of natural gas that’s frequently wasted through leaks or intentional releases during drilling operations. The gas is considered a more potent contributor to climate change than carbon dioxide, although it occurs in smaller volumes.
Under Trump, both the Interior Department and the EPA have proposed a series of rules — some blocked by courts — to loosen regulations of methane emissions.
— AP
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