Millions of tons of methane leaks into the atmosphere every year from the vast network of pipelines and equipment that move natural gas from oil and gas fields to American homes, commercial buildings and industrial and power plants.
After decades of writing off those leaks as the cost of doing business, the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, under President Joe Biden, is now moving to rein in those fugitive molecules of methane, the primary component of natural gas, setting up another fight with the oil and gas industry centered in Houston.
Under a proposed rule expected to be put into place next year, oil and gas companies would have to conduct monthly surveys of their systems with advanced leak detection equipment and quickly repair any problems they find, with the target of reducing pipeline emissions by more than 50%.
This represents a sharp shift from decades of U.S. natural gas policy, which has long allowed gas companies to leave small leaks to go unrepaired, said Bill Caram, executive director of the watchdog group Pipeline Safety Trust.
“There was an understanding before if an operator knew a pipeline was leaking, but it didn’t pose a threat of explosion they could allow it to continue to leak,” he said. “The current regulations haven’t been modernized in decades, and the technology has come a long way since then. And we know so much more about the impacts of methane than we did then.”
Driving the new regulations is concern around the risk of explosion from pipeline leaks along with growing awareness around climate change, with scientists at the United Nations warning methane carries a warming potential up to 34 times that of carbon dioxide.
And scientists continue to grapple with exactly how much methane natural gas drilling, pipelines and processing facilities are leaking into the atmosphere. In a study released last year, scientists at Stanford University found that 9% of all methane being produced in the New Mexico portion of the Permian Basin was being leaked — more than 6 times the national rate as reported by the Environmental Protection Agency.
The Biden administration has been seeking to rein in methane leaks across the board, with plans to put a fee on methane emissions from oil and gas drilling next year and offering incentives to homeowners who switch their home heating and cooking systems to electricity.
“Quick detection of methane leaks is an important way to keep communities safe and help curb climate change,” Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said in a statement earlier this year. “We are proposing a long-overdue modernization of the way we identify and fix methane leaks, thereby reducing emissions and strengthening protections for the American people.”
For natural gas and pipeline companies, the new rules could prove costly, requiring monthly surveys by airplane or helicopter, infrared equipment capable of detecting otherwise invisible methane leaks and sharp control on how pipeline companies operate their systems. The Interstate Natural Gas Association of America, which represents large pipeline companies such as Kinder Morgan and Enbridge, estimates the new rule could cost their industry more than $500 million per year.
They are proposing a loosening of the proposed leak regulation, allowing gas companies more time to repair leaks and require less frequent surveys of systems.
Ben Kochman, director of pipeline safety policy at INGAA, said while members are “committed to fixing leaks on their pipeline systems,” the proposed rule does not, “present a realistic and adequate structure for the gas transmission industry to ensure effective compliance.”
“We remain hopeful that PHMSA revises its proposal based on our recommended changes. Doing so will help us in our mutual goal to reduce methane emissions,” he said.
The rulemaking stems from bipartisan legislation that was included in an end-of-year spending bill and signed into law by former president Donald Trump in 2020.
Congress directed PHMSA to set rules requiring pipeline companies to seek out and repair methane leaks that presented a public hazard, and now oil and gas companies, along with some Republicans, are arguing that PHMSA has taken that authority too far by forcing repairs on small leaks unlikely to cause an explosion.
In a letter to the agency last month, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and Rep. Troy Nehls, R-Fulshear, were among Republicans criticizing the rule as going beyond what Congress intended in its focus on climate change.
“Specifically, it includes unnecessary and lengthy commentary regarding climate change, which fall beyond PHMSA’s mission, and fails to justify the practicability or the costs of the mandates proposed,” they wrote.
