Action Alerts

Tell the EPA to cut methane emissions

What's At Stake

It’s time to work together to cut methane pollution from the oil and gas industry. Join us in calling on the EPA to release a final rule that will aggressively cut methane pollution. 

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Methane is the second largest contributor to the climate crisis after carbon dioxide. On a pound-for-pound basis, methane traps 86 times more heat than carbon dioxide, making it far more potent and dangerous to our climate. The good news is that methane doesn’t stay in the atmosphere as long as other greenhouse gases, so decisive action to cut methane today can pay big dividends. 

We’ve already taken some steps under this administration to rein in methane. With your help, we pushed the EPA to accelerate its work on new methane standards and convinced Congress to roll back a disastrous Trump-era policy that let polluters off the hook for their methane emissions. Despite this progress, we need further bold action from the EPA to address the problem. 

We have the tools and technology to cut methane pollution from the oil and gas sector by as much as 65 percent below 2012 levels by 2025, but we need the government to act. Each year, the oil and gas industry releases 16 million metric tons of methane into the atmosphere, and without swift federal action, methane will continue to bake the planet. 

Not only does methane pollution from the oil and gas industry jeopardize the continued habitability of our planet, its extraction poisons communities. Methane is released alongside toxic pollutants such as benzene, formaldehyde, and ethylbenzene, which can cause debilitating health problems for millions of people. 

There is no time to waste — the EPA must take ambitious action and implement comprehensive new and existing source rules to cut methane pollution from the oil and gas sector before it’s too late.

Natural gas flare
Flared gas is burned off at Apache Corporations operations at the Deadwood gas plant in the Permian Basin on February 5, 2015 in Garden City, Texas. (Spencer Platt)

Delivery to the Environmental Protection Agency

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Your Actions Matter

Your messages make a difference, even if we have leaders who don't want to listen. Here's why.

You level the playing field.

Elected officials pay attention when they see that we are paying attention. Read more.

They may be hearing from industry lobbyists left and right, but hearing the stories of their constituents — that’s your power.

Our legislators serve at the pleasure of the people who gave them their job — you.

Make sure your elected officials know whose community and whose values they represent. When you contact your elected official, you’re putting a face and a name on an issue.

Whether or not you voted for them, they work for you, for the duration of their term.

Make sure your elected officials know whose community and whose values they represent. (Find your local, state, and federal elected officials.)

Your action is with us in court.

If a federal agency finalizes a harmful action, the record of public comments provides a basis for bringing them into court. Read more.

Throughout each of the public comment periods we alert you to, Earthjustice’s attorneys are researching and writing in-depth, technical comments to submit — detailing how the regulation could and should be stronger to protect the environment, our communities, and our planet.

We need you to join us — your specific experiences, knowledge, and voice are crucial to add to the Administrative Record through the comment periods.

Lawsuits we file that challenge weak or harmful federal regulations rely on what was submitted during the comment period. The court can only look at documents that are in the Administrative Record — including the public comments — to decide if the agency did something improper.

Your actions aid our litigation. Taking action and submitting comments during a comment period is substantively important.

It’s the law.

Federal agencies must pause what they’re doing and ask for — and consider — your comment. Read more.

Many of us may have never heard of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), but laws like these require our government to ask the public to weigh in before agencies adopt or change regulations.

Regulations essentially describe how federal agencies will carry out laws — including decisions that could undermine science, or weaken safeguards on public health.

Public comments are collected at various points throughout the federal government’s rulemaking process, including when a regulation is proposed and finalized. (Learn about the rulemaking process.) These comments become part of the official, legal public record — the “Administrative Record.”

When the public responds with a huge outpouring of support for environmental protections, these individual messages collectively undercut politicians' attempts to claim otherwise.

What this means is each of us can take a role in shaping the rules our government creates — and ensuring those rules are fair and effective.