It's not the cows?

   

In the course of about four hours of flying, we found at least six sites with high methane-emissions readings, ranging from about 300 pounds to almost 1,100 pounds an hour, including at DCP Pegasus, which is part owned by the energy giant Phillips 66.

Those readings would very likely put those sites in the category of “super emitters,” a term used by scientists to describe large-scale releases that are responsible for a disproportionately high share of methane emissions from oil and gas sites. In a 2017 study of the Barnett shale basin in Texas, methane releases of about 60 pounds or more an hour were classified as super emitters, making up just 1 percent of sites but accounting for nearly half of total emissions.

[...]

Detecting methane emissions is difficult work that often begins with flights like these. Oil and gas sites are not required to install round-the-clock emissions monitors, and flights are one of the ways to spot trouble.

[...]

Methane is loosely regulated, difficult to detect and rising sharply. The Times’s aerial and on-the-ground research, along with an examination of lobbying activities by the companies that own the sites, shows how the energy industry is seeking and winning looser federal regulations on methane, a major contributor to global warming.

[...]

Next year, the administration could move forward with a plan that would effectively eliminate requirements that oil companies install technology to detect and fix methane leaks from oil and gas facilities. By the E.P.A.’s own calculations, the rollback would increase methane emissions by 370,000 tons through 2025, enough to power more than a million homes for a year.

[...]

Operators of the sites identified by The Times are among the very companies that have lobbied the Trump administration, either directly or through trade organizations, to weaken regulations on methane, a review of regulatory filings, meeting minutes and attendance logs shows. These local companies, along with oil-industry lobby groups that represent the world’s largest energy companies, are fighting rules that would force them to more aggressively fix emissions like these.

[...]

The findings address the mystery behind rising levels of methane in the atmosphere. Methane levels have soared since 2007 for reasons that still aren’t fully understood. But fracking natural-gas production, which accelerated just as atmospheric methane levels jumped, is a prime suspect.

[...]

The regulatory rollback sought by the energy industry is the latest chapter in the administration’s historic effort to weaken environmental and climate regulations while waging a broad-based attack on climate science.

[...]

The efforts were part of a broader industry push to reverse Obama-era rules that would have forced operators to more aggressively monitor and repair natural gas leaks while reducing flaring.

[...]

The companies found an administration willing to listen. Before his appointment to the post of assistant administrator at the E.P.A. overseeing air pollution, William L. Wehrum lobbied on behalf of oil and gas producers, including gas processors and petroleum refineries.

But of course. While other Republican administrations have put people in charge of agencies who are expected to deter or destroy them, this administration has elevated that approach to art.

Mr. Wehrum resigned from the agency in June and is under investigation for his contacts with former clients. His former boss, Andrew Wheeler, the E.P.A. administrator, also lobbied for energy companies earlier in his career.

By this August, the E.P.A. had proposed a broad rollback, including rescinding direct regulations of methane emissions completely.

[...]

Methane leaks from oil and gas production threaten to erode the advantage that natural gas has over coal in meeting the world’s energy needs, scientists say. When burned for electricity, natural gas produces about half the carbon dioxide that coal does. But if methane is not burned off when released, it can warm the planet more than 80 times as much as carbon dioxide over a 20-year period.

  NYT

Oh, Christ. Trump is going to go back on the coal soap box when he hears. Make that when someone explains it to him.

Methane also contributes to ground-level ozone, which, if inhaled, can cause asthma and other health problems. “It’s increasingly clear that fossil fuel production has dramatically increased global methane emissions,” said Robert Howarth, an earth system scientist at Cornell University and author of a study estimating that North American shale gas production may be responsible for about a third of the global increase in methane emissions over the past decade.

[...]

Energy giants including BP, Exxon Mobil, Chevron and Shell have, to varying degrees, publicly supported methane regulation. However, trade associations representing all three, including the American Petroleum Institute and the Independent Petroleum Association of America, have fought against direct regulation.

How convenient.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.