The Biden Administration announced plans on Tuesday that will introduce some of the country’s strongest regulations against methane emissions from oil and gas drilling. It is part of a push to tackle climate change that the White House officials are announcing at the United Nations Climate Change Conference.
The new regulations are proposed by the Environmental Protection Agency that aim to curb methane emissions for new and existing oil and gas infrastructure, thereby reducing a significant source of pollution from fossil fuel companies. The rules will also target methane leaks or when methane gas is purposefully vented, or flared, during the production process.
According to the U.N. Environmental Program, methane is a potent greenhouse gas that has been responsible for roughly 30 percent of global warming since preindustrial times. An estimated 75% of the country’s methane emissions will be covered by the new EPA regulations.
In addition to the EPA regulations, John Kerry, Biden’s special presidential envoy for climate, announced Tuesday that more than 100 countries are set to join the United States and the European Union in pledging to collectively reduce the world’s methane emissions by 30 percent by the end of the decade.
Biden has joined Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, South Korean President Moon Jae-in and others to launch the so-called Global Methane Pledge, which Biden himself called a “game-changing commitment” that will help keep alive the Paris Agreement’s goal of limiting warming to below 1.5 degrees Celsius.
“This isn’t just something we have to do to protect the environment and future,” Biden said. “It’s an enormous opportunity for all of us, all of our nations, to create jobs and make many climate goals a core part of recovery as well.”
Sarah Smith, a program director at the Clean Air Task Force, praised the U.S. and E.U. leaders’ involvement in launching the Global Methane Pledge by saying, “For too long this potent super pollutant has fallen off the agenda at major climate summits while its emissions have risen to all-time highs, pushing our planet closer to potentially irreversible tipping points.”
She added, “By launching the Global Methane Pledge on the world stage, they’ve made sure that methane will be front and center — where it belongs.”
