EPA’S Job-Killing Oil and Gas Rule Challenged

Alabama Attorney General Luther Strange joined a coalition of 14 states and state agencies in filing suit against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s job-killing attack on the nation’s oil and natural gas industry.

The lawsuit, filed Tuesday, petitions the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit to review the EPA’s final rule regulating emissions standards for new, reconstructed and modified oil and gas operations.

Attorney General Strange and his partners argue this latest regulation imposes unnecessary and burdensome rules upon the oil and natural gas industry, while setting the stage for further limits on existing oil and gas operations before President Obama leaves office.

“Americans are already taxed and regulated to death by Washington and this new EPA rule is another bureaucratic attempt to restrict access to more affordable energy,” said Attorney General Strange. “We should be working to build up our country’s domestic energy production for the benefit of consumers and our struggling economy, not creating more obstacles to oil and gas.”

The coalition contends EPA’s rule is unnecessary and would raise production and distribution costs and, in turn, force an increase in consumer utility bills. The EPA itself predicts its regulations will cost $530 million in 2025, while other studies project the annual price tag may hit $800 million.

Attorney General Strange and the others contend that imposing unnecessary and costly regulations will jeopardize jobs in the nation’s natural gas, pipeline and construction sectors.

Those signing onto the lawsuit were West Virginia, Alabama, Arizona, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Montana, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Wisconsin, along with the Kentucky Energy and Environment Cabinet and North Carolina Department of Environmental Quality.