Energy Exchange

In January, the White House announced the ambitious goal of reducing methane emissions from the oil and gas industry by 40 to 45 percent over the next ten years. It was a landmark moment and a step toward making a great impact on greenhouse emissions and their effects on the climate by reducing a potent pollutant. Now, we await the rules EPA will propose later this summer to begin making that goal a reality.

In the coming days the EPA is expected to preview one piece of the plan the administration announced in January – Enhanced Natural Gas STAR, a program to enable companies to commit to voluntary actions to reduce emissions, and document progress toward achieving those commitments. The program is an important opportunity to ensure transparent and rigorous reporting of voluntary efforts to reduce emissions, but it is not a substitute for strong regulations and it is not the only step the administration has committed to taking. In its package of proposed rules that the administration has committed to release later this summer, the federal government will set, for the first time, methane emission limits from new and modified sources in the oil and gas industry, and is being called upon to implement rules to address leaks from existing sources as well. Read More »

If you want to catch fish, go where you know the fish are. That’s our best advice for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as they draw up details to set methane pollution limits for the oil and gas industry, expected later this summer. The agency knows where the “fish” are – they drew a pretty good map of key methane sources back in January when they announced their intentions to address methane. Now they just need a concrete plan to reel them in.

The Administration has announced that EPA will issue a proposed plan for action later this summer, with a proposed rule that will set first-ever limits on potent methane pollution from new and modified oil and gas sources. Together with other efforts from across government, this step can lay a strong foundation toward achieving the administration’s goal of reducing harmful methane pollution 40-45% below 2012 levels by 2025.

But as we know, the devil will be in the details, and for the oil and gas sector these details will be critically important. There are many different points along the supply chain where methane is being released uncontrolled—and in many cases undetected. The good news is that EPA knows this is a problem, and even collected extensive comments from experts and the public via a series of whitepapers on how to tackle the most significant emission points along the supply chain. Read More »