The Trump administration wants the European Union to exempt American oil and gas companies from a landmark law aimed at curbing emissions of methane, a powerful planet-warming gas.
In recent days U.S. diplomats have verbally informed officials in European countries that the Trump administration considers the 27-member bloc’s methane regulations costly, confusing and a threat to American gas supplies to Europe, according to four E.U. and U.S. officials.
Short of a repeal of the law, the United States wants American oil and gas companies to be exempted from any penalties, according to the four people, who had direct knowledge of the conversations, as well as a document that European energy ministers circulated among themselves ahead of a meeting on Monday in Brussels, which was obtained by The New York Times.
The four officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.
The methane law requires European importers to demonstrate, by 2027, that the oil and gas they buy from the United States or any other country adheres to strict monitoring standards. By 2030, all imports will have to be produced with low levels of methane emissions, though the specific threshold has not yet been finalized.
The law requires U.S. companies to report emissions and monitor or repair methane leaks in their oil and gas infrastructure in order to sell their fuel to European nations.
“It is regulatory overreach,” Chris Wright, the secretary of the Department of Energy, said of the regulation on Monday. He was speaking on the sidelines of an energy conference in Washington. The Trump administration’s opposition to the methane law was first reported by Reuters.
Europe’s methane law is the latest international climate policy attacked by the Trump administration as harmful to the American fossil fuel industry. President Trump has taken particular umbrage at Europe’s drive toward renewable power, claiming that climate policies have “devastated” the European economy.
But scientists say Europe has been devastated by climate change. This summer was the fourth-hottest on record in Europe. France, Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain, among other countries, suffered through extreme heat, health alerts and wildfires.
Reducing methane emissions is a key element of Europe’s climate strategy. Methane is considered a “super pollutant” because, while it breaks down more quickly than carbon dioxide, it traps about 80 times as much heat in the atmosphere in the short term. It is responsible for nearly a third of the rise in global temperatures since the start of the Industrial Revolution.
Methane, the main component in natural gas, leaks from oil and gas operations and is also intentionally released at refineries in a process known as flaring. Stopping leaks is seen as one of the most easily achievable climate fixes.
European and American oil and gas companies have lobbied for significant changes in the law.
They’ve noted that the European Union still has not finalized the way companies will need to report emissions and argued that the delay has led to confusion. And U.S. industry officials say they face unique challenges to meet a European requirement that companies precisely declare the origin of all the gas in every shipment. Unlike other countries, the United States has thousands of small gas fields and their output is often combined in pipeline systems, making origins hard to determine.
This year the Trump administration signed a trade deal with Europe that included a pledge for the European Union to purchase $750 billion in American oil and liquefied natural gas over three years in exchange for lower tariffs.
Mr. Wright warned that the methane restrictions pose a “huge” problem for trans-Atlantic trade, potentially making it “too legally risky” for the United States to sell gas to Europe.
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And he questioned the efficacy of the methane regulation.
“Just because it has the name, ‘the methane rule,’ does that mean it’s going to drive down method emissions faster? Absolutely not,” Mr. Wright said. He added: “Does that mean it might drive energy prices up and reduce energy supply into Europe? Absolutely.”
Environmentalists said the European Union was already working to iron out oil and gas industry concerns about the methane rule. None of the issues are big enough to require scrapping the law entirely or exempting any one country, they said.
“This really isn’t about the workability of the regulation,” said Dan Grossman, a vice president at the Environmental Defense Fund, a nonprofit group. “It’s more about this unhinged trade conversation that’s going on where the Trump administration is just wanting to push Europe to purchase hundreds of billions of dollars in U.S. oil and gas without any kind of standards or restrictions.”
Brandon Locke, the senior Europe policy manager overseeing methane issues for the Clean Air Task Force, called the U.S. opposition “perplexing.” He noted that U.S. companies stand to benefit from the law, since they’ve already invested billions of dollars in detecting and fixing leaks and reducing emissions.
He said if the United States gets an exemption, “you’re going to have 10 more lining up tomorrow, asking for the same thing,” and setting back efforts to fight climate change.
Dan Jorgensen, the European Union energy minister, said Monday the E.U. commission, the bloc’s executive branch, was in “a dialogue” with the Trump administration over how best to implement its methane policies.
“We are not considering withdrawing the legislation or an exemption to the legislation,” Mr. Jorgensen said on Monday after a commission meeting on energy.
Opposing solutions to climate change, both in the United States and abroad, has become a hallmark of the Trump administration.
This year diplomats from other nations accused the Trump administration of using bullying tactics to block the adoption of a landmark measure that would have imposed a global pollution tax on the shipping industry. The Trump administration recently sided with oil-rich countries including Saudi Arabia and Russia to block part of a United Nations report calling for the phaseout of fossil fuels.
The Trump administration also joined forces with Qatar to oppose Europe’s landmark sustainability rules, which require companies to root out environmental and social abuses in their supply chains.
At home, the administration has led a political assault on renewable energy. It has moved to repeal every federal climate change regulation. It tried to withdraw permits for six offshore wind projects, and eliminated federal incentives supporting wind, solar and electric vehicles.
Lisa Friedman is a Times reporter who writes about how governments are addressing climate change and the effects of those policies on communities.
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