An effort to overturn a rule limiting methane emissions from oil and natural gas drilling has failed in the Senate – a first in the Trump administration’s ongoing effort to repeal Obama administration regulations it deems burdensome to business.
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) rule requires companies drilling on federal land to curtail methane waste through venting or burning it at the well site. Its goals are both environmental – methane is a greenhouse gas that contributes to climate change – as well as financial – federal lands and their resources belong to taxpayers.