Sign up for our daily briefing
Make your busy days simpler with Axios AM/PM. Catch up on what's new and why it matters in just 5 minutes.
Stay on top of the latest market trends
Subscribe to Axios Markets for the latest market trends and economic insights. Sign up for free.
Sports news worthy of your time
Binge on the stats and stories that drive the sports world with Axios Sports. Sign up for free.
Tech news worthy of your time
Get our smart take on technology from the Valley and D.C. with Axios Login. Sign up for free.
Get the inside stories
Get an insider's guide to the new White House with Axios Sneak Peek. Sign up for free.
Catch up on coronavirus stories and special reports, curated by Mike Allen everyday
Catch up on coronavirus stories and special reports, curated by Mike Allen everyday
Want a daily digest of the top Denver news?
Get a daily digest of the most important stories affecting your hometown with Axios Denver
Want a daily digest of the top Des Moines news?
Get a daily digest of the most important stories affecting your hometown with Axios Des Moines
Want a daily digest of the top Twin Cities news?
Get a daily digest of the most important stories affecting your hometown with Axios Twin Cities
Want a daily digest of the top Tampa Bay news?
Get a daily digest of the most important stories affecting your hometown with Axios Tampa Bay
Want a daily digest of the top Charlotte news?
Get a daily digest of the most important stories affecting your hometown with Axios Charlotte
Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios
Two of Washington’s biggest lobbying groups say they support the Biden administration’s plan to regulate methane emissions from oil and gas wells.
Why it matters: The shift, instigated by the Chamber of Commerce and American Petroleum Institute, is one of the most concrete signs of how corporations are beginning to support action on climate change in the face of pressure from investors, politicians and the public.
Catch up quick: The organizations have for years opposed any direct regulation of methane, a greenhouse gas that’s the primary component of natural gas.
- Methane makes up about 10% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, but its warming impact on the planet is more potent over a shorter period than carbon dioxide, the most common heat-trapping gas.
- Methane, an invisible gas, leaks in the production and transportation processes of the fuel.
- Investors have increasingly called on oil and gas producers to cut methane emissions, and President Biden has vowed to regulate them no matter what the industry thinks.
What they’re saying:
- “We support the direct regulation of methane for new and existing sources in accordance with the Clean Air Act,” Mike Sommers, API’s president and CEO, told Axios Tuesday.
- The Chamber of Commerce updated its website Wednesday to say it supports cutting methane emissions, including “by direct regulation under the Clean Air Act.”
But, but, but: The organizations are couching their support around an additional process within the Clean Air Act, America’s bedrock pollution law, that could add many months to writing a regulation. Environmental advocates dispute this position.
How it works: Frank Macchiarola, senior vice president at API, says that to comply with the law, Biden’s Environmental Protection Agency must go through a scientific process confirming that methane from oil and gas wells contributes to endangering the public’s health and welfare.
- The Obama administration issued a broader scientific finding in 2009 concluding that all greenhouse gas emissions, including methane, did that.
- Macchiarola says that finding applied to mobile sources, not stationary sources like oil and gas wells, and was in a different part of the law.
- He says calling for this review isn’t tantamount to a delay and that such a finding is needed to stand up to legal scrutiny.
The other side: Peter Zalzal, an expert at the Environmental Defense Fund, says the EPA already made an additional scientific finding on this matter in 2016 as part of the Obama administration’s early work regulating methane.
- “There’s broad agreement that methane significantly contributes to harmful climate pollution and EPA has already made this finding in 2016, so let’s get going,” Zalzal said.
Go deeper: In aggressive climate plan, Biden’s position on natural gas is fuzzy