Oil sector suit targets EPA methane rules

OREANDA-NEWS. October 25, 2016. US oil and gas groups want to expedite litigation challenging the US Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) first time limits on methane emissions.

The American Petroleum Institute, the Independent Petroleum Association of America and other industry groups are hoping a federal appeals court will first rule on core legal issues associated with the methane regulations before moving onto implementation-based issues that might be avoided entirely.

Those groups filed separate lawsuits challenging the regulations in August but jointly made a bifurcation request on 21 October.

"This will enable the court to promptly resolve the fundamental legal issues related to whether EPA has authority under the [Clean Air Act] to issue the rules and regulate methane emissions," those trade groups and 15 states told the DC Circuit Court of Appeals.

The request comes as the EPA moves ahead with plans to further regulate oil and gas industry emissions of methane, which the agency estimates account for about 4pc of US greenhouse gas emissions. Under the Clean Air Act, those efforts depend on a court upholding the legality of the methane regulations being challenged by industry.

EPA's first-time methane regulations only affect oil and gas facilities newly constructed or modified after the agency published the rules on 3 June. Those rules require industry to use low-emission valves compressors and valves while also establishing leak detection and repair programs. EPA has just started looking into how to craft a far more complex regulation that would limit methane emissions from existing sources.

But industry groups and key energy-producing states such as Texas, Louisiana, West Virginia, Oklahoma and North Dakota challenging the rule have argued that EPA made many missteps when issuing the regulations, such as failing to make a specific finding that the oil and gas industry's methane emissions are contributing to climate change.

Those groups want the DC Circuit to resolve this and nine other core legal issues before moving onto implementation-based issues. Those core issues include EPA's reliance on the "social cost of methane" to estimates of the climate benefit of reducing emissions and new requirements to regularly search and repair leaks at compressor stations.

EPA has not opposed bifurcating the litigation, but on 21 October it asked the court to allow EPA and other parties to have a chance to submit proposals for how the lawsuit should proceed.