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A new proposal from the Trump administration would remove Obama-era Environmental Protection Agency restrictions on methane emissions from the oil and gas industries.

In an interview on August 29 for the TV network Cheddar, IU McKinney Professor of Practice Janet McCabe said that “regulatory relief is the driver here,” not measures to decrease pollution and increase public health, which she argues is the mission of the EPA’s Clean Air Act.

Methane is about 25 times more potent than carbon dioxide in trapping the Earth's heat. A vast majority of research cites methane as the primary driver of climate change, and the oil and gas industry is the largest source of methane emissions in the U.S.

Professor McCabe, director of the IU Prepared for the Environmental Change Grand Challenge Initiative, is a former EPA official.

The Trump administration proposal causes regulatory uncertainty, and not all energy companies are in favor of the change, Professor McCabe said. While many companies are focused on cleaner natural gas as an energy source, EPA regulations to regulate methane “make everyone play by the same rules,” she said.

“Natural gas is a non-renewable resource,” Professor McCabe said. “We should be using it in the most efficient way possible.”