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Federal policy on methane regulation, 2017
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In April 2017, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced it would begin formally repealing a 2016 federal rule issued by the Obama administration limiting methane emissions from oil and natural gas operations on private land. In March 2017, the EPA withdrew a 2015 request that oil and gas producers report data on their methane emissions to the agency. Though the EPA also said it would delay enforcement of the methane rule limiting emissions on privately owned land, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in July 2017 rejected the EPA's reasons to delay the rule's enforcement and ordered the agency to enforce it. Additionally, the U.S. Department of the Interior in June 2017 delayed compliance with the methane rule issued by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to limit methane emissions at oil and natural gas production sites on federal land.
This page tracked major events and policy positions of the Trump administration and the 115th United States Congress on methane regulation in 2017. Think something is missing? Please email us at editor@ballotpedia.org.
Trump administration 2017 on methane regulation
House vote to bar enforcement of EPA methane rule (September 2017)
On September 13, 2017, the U.S. House of Representatives passed an amendment that would prohibit the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from enforcing the Obama administration’s 2016 methane rule for oil and natural gas wells. The amendment was part of the House’s fiscal year 2018 spending bill. The amendment passed by a vote of 218-195.[1]
Delay of BLM methane rule for federal lands (June 2017)
On June 14, 2017, the U.S. Department of the Interior announced it would postpone compliance for a rule issued in 2016 by the U.S. Bureau of Land Management to limit methane emissions at oil and natural gas production sites on federal land. The rule would have required oil and gas operators to comply with the regulations beginning on January 17, 2018. However, the Interior Department announced it would postpone the compliance date due to "the regulatory uncertainty created by the pending litigation and the ongoing administrative review." In October 2017, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California overruled the department's decision to delay the compliance date, arguing that the Interior Department could not cite a provision of the Administrative Procedure Act as justification to delay compliance.[2][3]
Repeal of EPA methane rule for private lands (April 2017) and court ruling (July 2017)
On April 19, 2017, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced it would formally review and rescind the 2016 rule limiting methane emissions from oil and natural gas operations on private land. The rule would require oil and gas operators to follow federal standards for equipment and employee certification and to limit the flaring and venting of methane at drilling sites.[4][5][6][7][8][9]
On July 31, 2017, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit in a 9-2 decision ordered the EPA to enforce the Obama administration's 2016 methane rule. The judges ruled on July 3, 2017, that the EPA could not delay the rule's enforcement (see the paragraph below for details). Neither ruling affects the EPA's April 2017 decision to begin repealing the rule administratively.[10]
On July 3, 2017, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled that the EPA cannot delay implementation of the methane rule. In announcing the agency's decision to rescind the rule, EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt (R) said in April 2017 that the agency would not enforce the June 3, 2017, date by which regulated oil and gas operators would have to submit compliance plans for reducing methane emissions. On June 13, 2017, the EPA officially announced it would delay for two years the implementation of the methane rule. Two judges on a three-judge panel, however, rejected the agency's reasoning that the Obama administration did not give relevant stakeholders (such as oil and gas industry groups) sufficient opportunity to comment on portions of the final rule. The court argued that industry groups had received sufficient opportunities to comment on the rule and thus the EPA's delay was unjustified under the federal Clean Air Act. While the court ruled against the EPA’s decision to delay enforcement, its ruling does not affect the EPA’s actions to formally repeal the rule. However, the EPA would have to enforce the rule up until it is formally repealed.[11]
Withdrawal of methane reporting (March 2017)
On March 2, 2017, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) withdrew a request that oil and gas producers report data on their methane emissions to the agency. The EPA under the Obama administration in 2015 requested that oil and gas producers submit data on methane emissions from existing oil and gas wells as part of its regulations to limit methane. The agency previously sent letters to approximately 15,000 oil and gas operators requesting the data, which would include emissions numbers, the types of equipment at all onshore production facilities, all sources of methane emissions, and emission control technologies or practices used by the industry. On March 1, 2017, eleven states sent a letter to the EPA asking the agency to reverse the request: Alabama, Arizona, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas, and West Virginia.[12][13][14]
Overview of methane regulation
- See also: Methane
Methane is a colorless, odorless, nontoxic, and flammable gas that is the main component of natural gas. It is a naturally occurring gas emitted from sources such as wetlands, oceans, sediments, wildfires, and volcanoes. Human beings cause methane emissions during livestock cultivation, oil and natural gas extraction, and other industrial activities. People are exposed to limited amounts of methane outdoors, though methane can be harmful to human health in that it can be highly explosive or act as an asphyxiant in high concentrations in small spaces.[15][16]
In 2016, the Obama administration set the first-ever federal methane standards for new and significantly modified oil and natural gas operations. The administration set a goal of reducing methane emissions by 40-45 percent from 2012 levels by the year 2025 through a series of regulations on power plants and the oil and natural gas industries. These regulations were issued separately by the EPA and the U.S. Bureau of Land Management (BLM). The administration also joined an agreement with Canada to cut methane emissions.[17]
The EPA finalized its regulations in May 2016, and the BLM finalized its regulations in November 2016. The EPA regulations would cover all oil and gas facilities constructed, modified, or restructured after September 18, 2015, on federal and private land. The BLM regulations cover all existing oil and gas facilities on federal land. The goal of the EPA regulations is to limit methane as it relates to human-caused global warming, and the goal of the BLM regulations is to reduce the leaking of natural gas and to prevent reduced royalty revenue. Additionally, the BLM regulations would limit flaring, a process by which flammable natural gas is burned under controlled conditions during natural gas production.[17][18]
Support and opposition
Supporters of the rules, such as the Sierra Club, argue that the rules are necessary to reduce emissions and mitigate the purported effects of human-caused global warming. These supporters also argue that placing costs on oil and gas production will decrease their production and use and thus encourage greater use of solar, wind, and other renewable energy sources. Opponents of the methane rules, such as the American Petroleum Institute, argue that methane, which few people, such as oil and gas as well as some manufacturing workers, are exposed to at high levels, does not need additional regulation outside existing safety standards for oil and gas workers. These opponents also argue that the rules are duplicative of existing state regulations and thus provide little to no environmental benefit in exchange for potentially high costs to energy producers and consumers.[19][20][21]
Recent news
The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms Donald Trump methane. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles.
See also
- Federal policy on energy and the environment, 2017-2020
- Federal policy on climate change, 2017
- Federal policy on energy, 2017-2018
Footnotes
- ↑ Washington Examiner, "House votes to kill Obama-era methane rules," September 13, 2017
- ↑ The Hill, "Interior set to delay methane pollution rule," June 14, 2017
- ↑ The Hill, "Court blocks Trump’s ‘unlawful’ delay of Obama methane leak rule," October 4, 2017
- ↑ The Hill, "EPA begins review of key Obama methane rule," April 19, 2017
- ↑ Cite error: Invalid
<ref>tag; no text was provided for refs namedharvard - ↑ Washington Post, "Trump could roll back Obama rules on methane, a potent greenhouse gas," November 11, 2016
- ↑ S&P Global, "Factbox: Energy impacts of Trump's surprise US presidential victory," November 9, 2016
- ↑ The Hill, "14 Obama regs Trump could undo," November 12, 2016
- ↑ The Hill, "EPA moves to halt methane rules for two years," June 13, 2017
- ↑ The Hill, "Court tells EPA to enforce Obama methane rule," July 31, 2017
- ↑ The Hill, "Court rejects Trump's delay of EPA drilling pollution rule," July 3, 2017
- ↑ The Hill, "EPA pulls back methane request for drillers," March 2, 2017
- ↑ Business Insider, "The EPA will no longer require oil and gas companies to report their methane emissions," March 2, 2017
- ↑ Office of the Attorney General of Texas, "Request to Suspend and Withdraw the Environmental Protection Agency's Information Collection Request for Existing Oil and Gas Facilities," March 1, 2017
- ↑ Energy in Depth, "What is Methane?" accessed April 11, 2014
- ↑ U.S. Energy Information Administration, “Glossary, M” accessed January 28, 2014
- ↑ 17.0 17.1 U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, "Methane," August 9, 2016
- ↑ Congressional Research Service, "EPA's and BLM's methane rules," February 3, 2017
- ↑ U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, "EPA’s Actions to Reduce Methane Emissions from the Oil and Natural Gas Industry: Final Rules and Draft Information Collection Request," accessed August 24, 2016
- ↑ New York Times, "New Federal Rules Are Set for Fracking," March 20, 2015
- ↑ The Daily Signal, "4 Reasons Obama’s New Methane Emission Regulations Don’t Make Sense," August 18, 2015
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