Washington, DC -- Today, the Sierra Club and its partners filed a lawsuit challenging BLM’s recent decision to suspend key parts of a rule designed to reduce waste by limiting methane pollution from oil and gas operations on public lands.
If fully implemented, the methane rule will significantly reduce emissions of methane, a greenhouse gas that is 87 times more potent than carbon dioxide, in addition to reducing toxic air emissions from the oil and gas industry.
The lawsuit, filed by a coalition of environmental groups, aims to ensure that these commonsense measures to reduce waste and air pollution remain in place. The Sierra Club is represented in the lawsuit by Earthjustice. The delay was also challenged by the states of California and New Mexico last week.
Sierra Club Staff Attorney Elly Benson released the following statement:
"This rule has already withstood legal challenges and an attempted repeal in Congress, and now Donald Trump and Ryan Zinke want to undermine it with an indefinite delay. There should be nothing controversial about protecting our public lands and our communities by limiting pollution from oil and gas development. We will fight to ensure that these commonsense protections that reduce waste remain in place.”
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