The House voted Friday to cancel a Trump administration action that would have blocked the Environmental Protection Agency from controlling methane emitted by the oil and gas industry.
The resolution, passed 229-191 with largely Democratic support, will now head to President Joe Biden’s desk. A dozen Republicans voted with Democrats to approve the measure. The Senate approved the measure in April, also with a largely party-line vote.
SENATE VOTES TO CANCEL TRUMP EPA DEREGULATION IN EFFORT TO REINSTATE METHANE EMISSIONS CURBS
Once Biden signs it, the measure will reinstate a mandate for oil and gas companies to monitor and repair equipment leaking methane, a greenhouse gas dozens of times more potent than carbon dioxide.
The move from Congress is a win for Biden’s climate regulatory agenda because it quickly cancels a Trump EPA action that entirely removed the agency’s ability to regulate methane from the oil and gas industry directly.
Biden has directed the EPA to propose strict methane limits for new oil and gas operations and issue new regulations on methane from existing operations by September. If the Trump administration’s rule had remained in place, meeting that deadline would have likely been impossible.
Congress canceled the Trump methane deregulatory action under the Congressional Review Act, a procedural tool that allows both chambers of Congress to pass a joint resolution to scrap recently implemented regulations. The fast-tracked procedure requires only a simple majority vote for the Senate, avoiding the 60-vote filibuster threshold.
“Ambitiously addressing methane pollution can yield tremendous climate, public health, and financial” benefits, said House Energy and Commerce Chairman Frank Pallone, a New Jersey Democrat, in remarks on the House floor before the vote.
Pallone pointed to a report last month from the United Nations Environment Program and the Climate and Clean Air Coalition that found the oil and gas sector has the potential to reduce its methane emissions cheaply and cost-effectively.
Pallone and other Democrats also stressed that many oil and gas companies are backing the CRA resolution. For example, U.S. producers Devon Energy, Cheniere, Occidental Petroleum, EQT Corporation, and Pioneer Natural Resources have supported the resolution, calling for federal regulations on methane. European oil majors Shell, BP, and Total also backed the move.
It is yet to be seen, however, the stringency of methane controls oil and gas companies would support.
Republican lawmakers, meanwhile, are warning that scrapping the Trump administration’s deregulatory move opens the door for the EPA to target greenhouse gas emissions from other industrial sectors.
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“This is just the tip of the iceberg,” said Rep. John Joyce, a Pennsylvania Republican, in remarks on the House floor before the vote.
The Biden EPA will use the resolution “as a predicate to new regulation,” he added. “Virtually every other industry in America certainly could be next.”
