Trump methane emissions rules terminated, president says in Texas
Donald Trump announced at a rally in Lubbock, Texas, on Tuesday evening that his administration is terminating the Biden-era methane emissions rules on oil and gas companies, a step he said would save consumers and energy producers $45bn.
Trump methane emissions rules terminated, president says in Texas
What Trump announced
Speaking at a rally in Lubbock, Texas, on Tuesday evening, Donald Trump said his administration is officially terminating the Biden-era methane regulations imposed on oil and gas companies. The move on the trump methane emissions rules was presented as a way to encourage more domestic drilling as he faces criticism over high fuel prices stemming from the US war in Iran.
The president said the change would save consumers and energy producers $45bn and unlock 210 million barrels of oil, which he put at about 10 days of US petroleum consumption. He described the rules as among the crippling regulations on methane that caused prices to skyrocket for small oil and gas operators.
"Tonight, I'm officially terminating Biden's expensive and unnecessary methane regulations to save consumers and energy producers"
The EPA's proposal
The announcement runs alongside a parallel proposal from the Environmental Protection Agency. Administrator Lee Zeldin praised the move in a press release as ending what he called the war on oil and natural gas, revising the regulations under the Clean Air Act.
According to the EPA, the proposal is expected to save $45bn for consumers and businesses, including small businesses operating marginal wells, and to produce an estimated 210m additional barrels of oil and 1.41tn cubic ft of natural gas. Zeldin had already announced in March 2025 that the agency was reconsidering the Biden-Harris regulations, saying it needed to avoid preventing energy dominance and emissions reductions leadership.
What the 2024 rule required
The rule now being terminated set obligations for operators across the oil and gas sector:
- Operators had to eliminate and minimize leaking, flaring and venting of methane and volatile organic compounds, which harm human health
- It was the first federal nationwide limit on methane from existing oil and gas facilities; an earlier 2016 Obama-era rule applied only to new and modified sources
- A super emitter program required companies to investigate major leaks near facilities detected by third parties using EPA-approved remote sensing technology
Last year the US emitted more methane from its oil and gas sector than any other country, and methane causes at least a quarter of today's warming.
Industry pressure and criticism
The deregulation push followed sustained private lobbying. Records obtained via FOIA by the watchdog Fieldnotes show that industry trade groups and corporations worked behind the scenes to gut the methane regulations, even as some executives publicly backed the rule. Calendar events, slides and meeting forms in the records show industry groups met the EPA at least 38 times about the methane regulations during the administration's first year.
Fieldnotes researcher Julia Kane said the industry presents itself as a good-faith partner but has repeatedly worked to delay and weaken the regulations.
"time and time again it's worked behind the scenes to delay and weaken them"
Among those records, Independent Petroleum Association of America executive Lee Fuller said on a conference call that EPA staff were suddenly willing to talk about industry requests they had ignored for years. At a Trump rally in Corpus Christi earlier on the day of the announcement, the president shouted out Harold Hamm, founder of Continental Resources, who was in the audience. In April, Continental Resources had written to the EPA opposing measures in the methane rule that prohibit routine flaring of associated gas.
Environmental groups opposed the move. Rosalie Winn of the Environmental Defense Fund said the administration is enabling the worst polluters in the industry to continue to make ever more money, off American consumers and while wasting energy.
According to Environmental Defense Fund calculations, since the EPA stopped enforcing oil and gas regulations in March 2025, operators have leaked, vented or flared $7bn worth of natural gas.
