As I suggested in my last blog post, the oil and natural gas industry is really not stepping up to the plate to support Energy Secretary Chris Wright, despite all he’s done for us. I’m not really aware of many companies or trade associations that are planning to comment on the Energy Department’s “Critical Review of Impacts of Greenhouse Gas Emissions on the U.S. Climate” nor the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) reconsideration of the Endangerment Finding, even though the latter is the basis for over a trillion dollars of regulatory actions that are damaging to our industry and the economy overall.
Last week, EPA held four days of public hearings on the rule to overturn the endangerment finding. Grace van Deelan at Eos reports that in 12 hours and hundreds of speakers, only 20 people spoke in support of the rule—API, various auto industry trades, and me. I personally could only sit through about three hours, but kudos to her for toughing it out. Eos is the reporting arm of AGU or Advancing Earth and Planetary Sciences, which is apparently an advocacy group, because there wasn’t much “scientific” about her article or the AGU website.
A true earth and planetary scientist would want to engage on the issues critically. Instead, ACU seems content to elevate medical doctors in unrelated disciplines and mothers in the Moms Clean Air Force repeating again and again the need for the Obama-era endangerment finding in order to save kids from asthma and the vague stress of a changing world, none of which is supported by actual science. In true form, the very first speaker at the hearing was a gastroenterologist (he/his) put forth as a climate change “expert”, but whose expertise is “communicating” about climate change. I got a taste of the state of earth and planetary science in academia today when listening to a professor at the University of New Mexico relate all manner of unscientific effects of climate change, including her air conditioning expenses. In other words, there were a lot of speakers urging EPA not to overturn the endangerment finding, but very few scientific facts to be found.
I tuned in for API’s comments, and they supported overturning the tailpipe emissions standards, but that’s noncontroversial and bipartisan. I was the only one from the oil and natural gas industry that stood up for overturning the endangerment finding itself. Hopefully, there are those who will submit supportive written comments, but at this point, I’m not sure. The same can be said for comments from industry on DOE’s critical review of climate science. I fear that my industry will stay largely silent, and that’s a shame. If the endangerment finding is overturned, there’s a clearer path to correcting poor Biden-era methane rules. Industry can still continue its three and a half decade record of success reducing methane emissions, including before EPA methane regulations. Companies will still continue to innovate, take voluntary measures, and follow state and federal regulations.
I’ll be submitting letters for both DOE’s and EPA’s comment periods. I’m near a final draft for the DOE comments, which are due September 2nd, and I don’t pull any punches. I’ve got a good start on the endangerment finding comments, which are due September 22nd, and those comments will be fully supportive as well. I hope others step up to the plate, but I’m not seeing signs yet. If you’d like to get in on the action, please let me know. I could use some back-up.
