Swordsmyth
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The proposed rule follows President Donald Trump’s directions to remove “unnecessary and duplicative regulatory burdens from the oil and gas industry,” Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Andrew Wheeler said in a statement.
The step would be the latest in a series unwinding the Obama administration’s efforts to cut climate-changing emissions from the oil, gas and coal industries, including a 2016 rule regulating oil-industry methane leaks as a pollutant under the federal Clean Air Act.
Trump has pushed to open vast expanses of U.S. wilderness and coastline to oil and gas drilling, speed construction of petroleum pipelines and ease regulations on the industry, dismissing calls from scientists in and out of government for rapid cuts in oil, gas and coal emissions to stave off the worst of climate change.
Asked about global warming this week, Trump only lauded the United States’ “tremendous wealth.” ″The wealth is under its feet,” he said, praising oil and gas production.
Under Trump, both the Interior Department and the EPA have proposed a series of rules — some blocked by courts — to loosen regulation of methane emissions.
Controls on other, regulated pollutants would also capture methane before it leaks from pipelines, said Erik Milito of the American Petroleum Institute.
The Obama-era requirements to find and fix methane leaks imposed “a disproportionate effect on small businesses” in the oil industry, Milito said. “A lot of mom and pops would have their wells shut in, elderly people with wells on their properties that could be shut down” under the rules to be rescinded.
More at: https://www.apnews.com/e2872a46eb3e43bd928707bba2f2c031
The step would be the latest in a series unwinding the Obama administration’s efforts to cut climate-changing emissions from the oil, gas and coal industries, including a 2016 rule regulating oil-industry methane leaks as a pollutant under the federal Clean Air Act.
Trump has pushed to open vast expanses of U.S. wilderness and coastline to oil and gas drilling, speed construction of petroleum pipelines and ease regulations on the industry, dismissing calls from scientists in and out of government for rapid cuts in oil, gas and coal emissions to stave off the worst of climate change.
Asked about global warming this week, Trump only lauded the United States’ “tremendous wealth.” ″The wealth is under its feet,” he said, praising oil and gas production.
Under Trump, both the Interior Department and the EPA have proposed a series of rules — some blocked by courts — to loosen regulation of methane emissions.
Controls on other, regulated pollutants would also capture methane before it leaks from pipelines, said Erik Milito of the American Petroleum Institute.
The Obama-era requirements to find and fix methane leaks imposed “a disproportionate effect on small businesses” in the oil industry, Milito said. “A lot of mom and pops would have their wells shut in, elderly people with wells on their properties that could be shut down” under the rules to be rescinded.
More at: https://www.apnews.com/e2872a46eb3e43bd928707bba2f2c031
