Biden’s EPA methane gas rule imposes needless environmental costs

The Biden U.S Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued new methane gas detection, repair and reporting rules in December 2023, impacting existing, new and reconstructed onshore crude oil (crude) and natural gas (ngas) production facilities. The state of Texas Railroad Commission which regulates many parts of the state’s crude and ngas industry asked the Texas Attorney General’s office to sue the Biden administration over this new rule. This new federal rule is another battle in the states war to eliminate the use of ngas in daily life.

The EPA belief is methane gas emissions that make up over ninety-five percent of ngas is a human action contributing to global warming or greenhouse gas in the earth’s atmosphere. One sentence from the new rule EPA fact sheet states, “Methane is a climate ‘super pollutant,’ and rapid, sharp cuts in methane emissions are a crucial addition to cutting carbon dioxide in slowing the rate of warming of Earth’s atmosphere.” The federal official deception on this topic being stated as truth shows the everyday people have little trust in these subject matter experts.

EPA also claims that, “Methane . . . is more potent than carbon dioxide and is responsible for approximately one third of current warming resulting from human activities.” How EPA claims that methane gas does this is mind blowing when other published studies do not support their view. They move forward with more rule burdens and costs for onshore lower 48 state ngas production under the guise this human action will solve the problem of another human action. These increased regulatory costs will appear on the monthly ngas meter bill for your home, business, nonprofit entity and government building.

Part of the final rule defines a super emitter event (SEE) as methane gas detected from an onshore ngas production facility using a remote detection method with a quantified emission of 220.26 pounds per hour. The facility owner/operator is notified of a SEE by the EPA and within five calendar days of notification must start a SEE investigation.

This monitoring and investigation cost and time burden can be handled by larger crude and ngas production companies who have the income margin. The rule impact on mid-size and smaller ngas production companies is not good when their income margins are smaller. Some smaller ngas companies indicated this extra cost will yield lower profits that may force them to shut in crude and/or ngas producing wells. This new rule harms U.S domestic crude and ngas production which set daily and annual production records in 2023 despite the Biden administration ongoing war on crude and ngas.

The proposed rules received over one million individual public comments during the federal public notice and comment period, which is unusual. The EPA announces, “Benefits of the rule far outweigh costs. EPA estimates the rule will yield net climate and ozone health benefits of $97 to $98 billion dollars from 2024-2038 ($2019), with rule benefits far outweighing the new compliance costs to the ngas industry. . ..”

This EPA new rule statement overlooks the real business and human cost of another needless federal rule intervention. The rule places climate and ozone health over human and business health leading to needless higher costs. This is another sign of the incessant federal war to crush crude and ngas use which today allow modern life to flourish.