WASHINGTON— President Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency proposed today to significantly weaken limits on methane pollution from oil and gas production.

“Trump’s Environmental Destruction Agency continues its rampage by torching limits on superheating methane, some of the last remaining protections against climate-heating pollution,” said Maggie Coulter, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity's Climate Law Institute. “This move will compound the climate chaos we see mounting all around us in deadly heatwaves, floods and storms. Vulnerable communities will be exposed to worse smog and intensified respiratory pollution, increasing kids’ asthma and other health problems. We’ll fight this disastrous rollback with everything we’ve got.”

Today’s move loosens requirements for oil and gas producers to detect and repair leaks and limit their emissions of super-polluting methane gas.

Methane is a climate pollutant that heats the atmosphere over 80 times more than the same amount of carbon dioxide over a 20-year period. Methane contributes to smog, which leads to asthma and other health problems, particularly for children, older adults and people who work outdoors.

Global methane and carbon dioxide levels hit a record high this year, according to the annual “state of the climate” report released this month.

Today’s proposal would gut requirements for inspections and equipment upgrades at low-producing, highly polluting “marginal wells.” These wells produce only about 7% of the country’s oil and gas but spew around half its methane emissions.

“It’s senseless to eliminate the low-hanging fruit of protections against methane,” said Coulter. “The Trump administration is choosing to cut one of the most effective ways to address health and climate threats just to line fossil fuel producers’ pockets. Americans are too smart to buy Trump’s ridiculous claims that this will somehow compel oil and gas operators to lower gas prices out of the goodness of their hearts.”