by Ellen M. Gilmer

The Trump administration must enforce Obama-era restrictions on greenhouse gas emissions from the oil and gas industry — at least for now.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit last night issued a mandate striking down U.S. EPA’s attempt to pause methane restrictions for the sector. The agency’s 90-day stay of key provisions of New Source Performance Standards is now formally vacated, and the rule is in effect.

According to the D.C. Circuit, EPA exceeded its authority when it paused the rule to consider industry concerns (*Greenwire* <https://www.eenews.net/stories/1060056926/>, July 3). The three-judge panel reached that conclusion in early July but had given EPA extra time to weigh its legal options before enforcing the regulation — which the Trump administration ultimately plans to reconsider through a public process.

States and industry intervenors that oppose the Obama administration rule last week asked all the court’s active judges to rethink the decision. To the surprise of many court watchers, EPA has not made its own request.

Nine of the court’s 11 active judges last night decided to issue the panel’s mandate and unfreeze the methane rule. But the court is still weighing intervenors’ request for rehearing and asked environmental groups and a coalition of states to file a response by tomorrow afternoon.

The order notes that Judges Janice Rogers Brown and Brett Kavanaugh, both George W. Bush appointees, would not have issued the mandate. The legal back-and-forth means continued uncertainty for the oil and gas industry, which for months has aggressively lobbied EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt to scrap the standards, which are designed to reduce methane leaks from wells and other infrastructure.

The American Petroleum Institute and other critics have argued that Obama’s EPA ignored voluntary efforts oil and gas operators were taking to slash emissions.

“API continues to support an extension of the compliance deadlines, as a stay or extension is appropriate to allow EPA time to review and, as necessary, revise the 2016 EPA final rulemaking,” Howard Feldman, API’s senior director for regulatory and scientific affairs, said in a statement last night.

Feldman added that EPA’s separate, ongoing consideration of a two-year stay of the methane standards will avoid “subject[ing] businesses to on-again, off-again, requirements until EPA can reconsider the rule.”

Environmental groups, meanwhile, celebrated the news as a win for climate and clean air protections.

“Today’s issuance of the mandate by the full D.C. Circuit protects families and communities across America under clean air safeguards that EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt sought to unlawfully tear down,” Environmental Defense Fund attorney Peter Zalzal said in a statement. EPA did not respond to a request for comment.