The oil industry is getting ready for the Obama administration to issue a slew of final regulations soon after next week’s election, according to the oil industry’s lead lobbying group and consultants in Washington.
“As this administration prepares to release the last of its regulations and as we approach the election, it’s important that the significant progress that we have made, continues,” Kyle Isakower, the American Petroleum Institute’s vice president for regulation, told reporters on Tuesday.
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“Right now, the United States is leading the world in the production of oil and natural gas,” he said, and Obama’s new regs could place a damper on that. Isakower’s group represents oil and gas producers.
There are a number of new regulations that the oil and natural gas industry is waiting for the administration to finalize one week before the presidential election, including regulations for methane emissions from drilling. Officials are also expected to release a key study on the safety of hydraulic fracturing, and the Interior Department will soon be releasing a landmark five-year energy plan to determine where it will allow offshore drilling to take place.
The president wants these rules finalized before he steps down in January. Consultants and observers in Washington say how fast the administration acts to get these regulations out depends on who wins. The administration is much more inclined to push out the rules sooner if Republican nominee Donald Trump wins on Nov. 8, because it would give him less of a chance to roll them back once he’s in the Oval Office.
For Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, the Obama administration has been holding back these regulations, especially the five-year plan, to provide her with a level of political cover, and not provide ammunition for criticism by the environmental Left that wants oil drilling completely rescinded under the plan, say observers. Anything that shows the Democrats are even slightly inclined to support oil drilling could cost her votes, observers say.
It will be a different story after the elections, and there will be a big push to make the five-year plan final as soon as possible. Many suggest the plan could be issued as soon as Nov. 9, once the election is out of the way. The administration has said it has until the end of the year to issue the five-year plan.
Fossil fuel proponents, the chemical industry, manufacturers and others want the plan to keep things like drilling in the Arctic open in the final plan, which will determine offshore leasing by the government from 2017-22.
An earlier draft of the plan kept Arctic drilling open, although the environmental community has put extreme pressure on President Obama to ban drilling there. As a result, industry fears he will reverse his decision in response to the outcry.
The administration’s move to secure a number of new offshore wildlife refuges and national park areas is a sign that the White House may be preparing to tighten restrictions on the industry’s offshore drilling activities. The administration had already reneged on opening up drilling off the coast of the Atlantic, and drillers fear it could do the same with other areas.
Green groups supporting a nationwide ban on fossil fuel production, called the Keep It In The Ground movement, want the five-year plan to restrict drilling off all the coasts.
Besides the five-year plan, the Environmental Protection Agency’s final report determining the effect of hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, on drinking water supplies is also a key priority for industry. Many fear the EPA could reverse its previous finding that fracking presented no harm to the water supply, especially after the EPA’s Science Advisory Board earlier this year that the agency erred in its analysis. Isakower’s group supports the original finding.
