OKLAHOMA CITY – The lawsuit led by Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond in a challenge of the Environmental Protection Agency’s new methane emissions limits prompted the SEC to delay implementation of its final rule on climate requirements of the oil and gas industry.
The Securities and Exchange Commission announced it will hold off on implementing its own final rule to require companies to reveal their climate-related risks. The delay was the result of a lawsuit against the EPA by Drummond and 23 other GOP Attorneys General who contended the EPA overstepped its authority.
As The Hill reported, the delay does not mean it is abandoning its own rule, and will continue defending a court challenge by Republican attorneys general.
The lawsuit was filed March 12 in the US. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. It asks the court to block the regulation, which Drummond described as a “blatant attack on America’s oil and gas industry.”
The Attorney General stated that if the rule is implemented, it would “cost Oklahoma countless jobs, devastate the oil and gas industry, and force us to pay significantly higher energy prices.”
As OK Energy Today reported at the time of the filing, the rule contains 408 pages of requirements that the attorneys general called “expensive and unjustified new technology and monitoring requirements” and “creates a ‘Super Emitter’” program that third-party environmental advocacy groups can use to harass producers.”
Also signing the petition were attorneys general of Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia and Wyoming, as well as the Arizona state legislature.