"EPA should expect a massive lawsuit if it does not abandon its efforts to stop regulating methane emissions from the oil and gas sector, more than 20 cities and states said last week.
The agency's plan to amend an Obama-era rule governing greenhouse gas emissions and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) turns a "blind eye" to EPA's own findings that such releases are harmful to public health and welfare, the municipalities said.
"Gutting a common-sense rule that protects the health of our environment and of our citizens is contrary to the mission and purpose of the EPA," Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh (D), said in a statement accompanying the coalition's comments Friday.
"EPA and the Trump Administration have again ignored clear evidence of harm to our natural resources and our communities while siding with corporate polluters," he continued.
Frosh joined the attorneys general of California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington and the District of Columbia, along with the cities of Chicago and Denver and the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment, in opposing the rule."
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