Inside the Struggle to Dismantle America’s Greenhouse Gas Data

Washington, D.C., August 18, 2026 – The fossil fuel industry is trying to weaken methane reporting requirements while simultaneously fighting to preserve the related federal emissions database it relies on for credibility, according to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) records recently released in response to a freedom of information request.

When the Trump administration announced plans last year to repeal the federal government’s greenhouse gas reporting system, rather than celebrate, many oil and gas companies publicly urged the EPA to preserve it. But for more than a year, behind closed doors, the fossil fuel industry has been pushing to weaken one of the reporting program’s most consequential elements.

Oil and gas companies fear this Biden-era revision to the methane reporting rule known as Subpart W, would force them to disclose much higher — and previously hidden — pollution levels. Those concerns, brewing for years, grew into a wave that ultimately would break onto the friendly shores of the Trump EPA in response to the agency’s expected overhaul of both the methane reporting rule and the Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program (GHGRP), the most comprehensive system for tracking the nation's greenhouse gases, industry comments and public records show.

At a private trade group meeting in 2023, one energy analyst said the revised methane rule would be a “major PR headache” for oil and gas companies. “How do we even go talk to our investors and explain that this is what’s happening?” he said. “Things that historically potentially had gone unreported will now have to be reported.”

In 2025, an industry consultant predicted that some companies could see their reported methane emissions increase by four to ten times under the rule’s new methodology. As recently as this spring, another consultant speaking to a gas group conference warned that updated disclosure requirements would increase reported methane emissions by roughly 16 percent. Last month, major gas producer EQT cited this revised rule as one reason its reported methane emissions rose in 2025.

New documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act by the National Security Archive and shared with DeSmog detail industry’s attempts to loosen federal methane pollution reporting requirements while simultaneously urging the U.S. government to preserve the GHGRP. This is the EPA’s overarching emissions monitoring system, which offers public data informing policy decisions, and currently is targeted by the Trump administration. The resulting regulatory changes could have major implications for helping the U.S. address the rapidly accelerating climate crisis, from the local to international level.

“Oil and gas CEOs will always support weak rules they already comply with rather than no rules at all,” Edward Maibach, a climate change communication expert at George Mason University, said by email to the National Security Archive and DeSmog. “Supporting no rules at all would prove to everyone how untrustworthy they are.”

Measuring the Methane Problem

The methane rule known as Subpart W represents one of dozens of reporting requirements tailored to industry emissions sources under GHGRP. This rule covers large petroleum and natural gas systems, including on and offshore oil and gas drilling sites, their pipelines, compressors, and liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminals. As of 2023, it affected nearly 2,300 facilities emitting 322 million metric tons of CO2 equivalent, including methane, CO2, and nitrous oxide.

Methane, a heat-trapping pollutant more powerful than carbon dioxide in the short term, is the main component of natural gas. After carbon dioxide, methane accounts for the bulk of those facilities’ reported climate pollution. According to the EPA, the oil and gas industry is the largest source of methane emissions in the United States, and gas utilities appear particularly concerned about the future reporting and perception of these emissions.

Although this methane monitoring rule has been around since 2010, in 2023 the Biden administration proposed key revisions that caused the fossil fuel industry to start worrying about a “major PR headache” and eventually lay the groundwork for defanging the rule once President Trump regained office. Finalized in 2024, those regulatory changes crucially altered the ways companies were required to estimate methane pollution by incorporating sources not previously covered by the program, such as super emitter events and equipment regulating natural gas pressure and flow. Many oil and gas groups pushed back against these revisions, and those comments would eventually lay the groundwork for defanging the rule once President Trump regained office.

One of the monitoring rule’s stated goals is informing regulations to help address climate pollution — measure the problem, then understand how to fix it. For instance, emissions reported under the rule feed into a separate methane tax on companies discharging over a certain pollution threshold (although that regulation is currently delayed until 2034). This tax would affect many of the nation's low-producing marginal, or "stripper wells, which, recent studies show, generate around 6 percent of U.S. oil and gas output but roughly half of its methane emissions.

When the Biden-era revisions took effect on January 1, 2025, oil and gas industry groups sued, but the lawsuit has been temporarily halted.

Two months into President Trump’s second term, as part of sweeping deregulatory rollbacks,” EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin proposed placing the entire GHGRP, including the methane disclosure rule, on the chopping block, describing the broader program as overly “burdensome” and costly. Separately, the agency moved to revamp the revised methane reporting rule.

The EPA’s first announcement — axing the entire GHGRP — was met with outrage from dozens of environmental groups. But the proposed rollback had another critic: the fossil fuel industry. 

Multiple trade associations and companies including the American Gas Association (AGA), the American Petroleum Institute (API), the American Exploration & Production Council (AXPC), ExxonMobil, Shell, and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce all submitted public comments in favor of preserving the GHGRP. They called on the administration to “improve the program rather than suspend it.”

While most industry groups say they don’t want the program repealed, they did ask the EPA for more flexibility in estimating and measuring methane emissions. Last September, Zeldin delivered on this latter request: the EPA proposed a rule repealing the Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program with eroded methane reporting requirements and delayed timelines until 2034.

The EPA is expected to propose its final rule on the GHGRP any day. If finalized, it would exempt more than two-thirds of the roughly 8,000 industrial facilities, including power plants, steel mills, and refineries, from mandatory emissions reporting. The agency says it would save $303 million annually. A March study in the journal Nature found U.S. greenhouse gas emissions from 1990-2020 caused $3 trillion in damages to the nation, and another $7 trillion globally, figures expected to rise.

Separately, the EPA is expected to propose a rule overhauling the current methane pollution disclosure requirements on the oil and gas industry.

The Battle Over Methane

Four days before President Trump took office the second time, the Deputy General Counsel of the American Gas Association (AGA), Timothy R. Parr, sent a letter to the EPA’s transition team outlining the trade group’s “top priority recommendations” for the agency. (Document 1) The AGA represents U.S. natural gas utilities, which are major methane emitters.

Buried in the middle of Parr’s letter was a special, if technical-sounding, request: “increased use of facility- and company-derived emission factors and advanced methane measurement technologies in Subpart W.” In other words, AGA was encouraging the EPA’s transition team to revise the methane pollution reporting rule to allow for less federal oversight and more discretion from oil and gas companies, which could ultimately lead to looser rules on what gets reported.

Less than two months later, on the eve of Zeldin’s deregulatory announcement, AGA emailed the EPA, requesting a staff-level meeting to discuss its environmental and energy priorities, specifically the methane disclosure rule, according to public documents. (Document 4)

Public records obtained by Fieldnotes, an oil and gas industry watchdog, and seen by the National Security Archive and DeSmog, show that AGA wasn’t the only fossil fuel group to request a meeting with EPA last year to discuss overhauling methane reporting requirements. Shortly before Zeldin announced a separate reconsideration for the rule, API, which as early as 1999 has coordinated industry strategy opposing potential federal greenhouse gas regulation, met with EPA staff in early March 2025 to discuss this provision. Afterwards, API met with the EPA at least three more times in 2025 and asked for a fifth meeting to talk about EPA’s review of the rule. 

The American Exploration & Production Council, which represents U.S. independent oil and gas drillers, convened with the agency at least once, and the Independent Petroleum Association of America (IPAA), another lobby group for U.S. independent oil and gas companies, met with the EPA at least twice to discuss the subject.

As AXPC presented its priorities to EPA in May last year, the trade group emphasized changes it wanted to see to the agency's Super Emitter Program and how it handles large methane leaks from, say, a leaking well or faulty tank battery. Such pollution releases play an outsized role in climate change, studies show, and the 2024 Biden-era methane rules created the Super Emitter Program, which certifies third-party groups to help quickly identify and stop these leaks via technology such as satellites.

AXPC support for the program has gone back and forth, stating in May 2024 comments to the EPA that it serves "an important function" but could be improved if it did not "trigger mandatory actions," such as "repair and reporting requirements." The group specifically voiced concerns about legal risk, a point that would come up again in its May 2025 presentation to the EPA.

A year later, under Trump, the trade group had changed its tune on the Super Emitter Program, telling the EPA the program was a "significant strain on resources," "subject to litigation," and had "seemingly no transparency," according to public records obtained by Fieldnotes and shared with the National Security Archive and DeSmog. AXPC recommended axing the program from all requirements, but if it remained, modeling it after the EPA's Natural Gas STAR program -- a voluntary initiative with historically extreme low participation rates.

In an emailed response to the National Security Archive and DeSmog, a representative from API attached the group’s original petition for reconsideration and a comment letter submitted to the EPA, co-signed by AXPC. 

In that letter, API requested "that the EPA strike a balance between reducing the burdens of information collection and reporting requirements and advancing the benefits" of the GHGRP, such as its "high quality data" for stakeholders, wrote Dustin Meyer, API Senior Vice President of Policy, Economics, and Regulatory Affairs. The program's cited benefits, ranging from "showcasing company and industry progress" on emissions to supporting claims for carbon capture, hydrogen, and biofuels tax credits, outweigh its costs, Meyer adds, particularly with API's suggested changes to the methane reporting rule.

Separately, IPAA also emailed and attached its comment letter to the EPA. “[IPAA’s] opposition results from the adverse effects the definition creates for small business, low production well operators and its inconsistencies with the Clean Air Act,” an IPAA representative wrote. “The complexity of the 2024 Biden Administration Subpart W calculation process will also likely force thousands of independent producers to incur significant costs to just confirm they fall below reporting thresholds.” IPAA members include many smaller companies operating stripper wells that it says current methane rules threaten to make "unviable." 

The EPA said in an emailed statement it is currently reviewing public comments received on its GHGRP proposal. The AGA and AXPC did not respond by the time of publication.

EPA assistant administrator Aaron Szabo, a former oil and gas lobbyist and previous advisor at the America First Policy Institute, has been soliciting input from oil industry groups to weaken methane rules, including on stripper wells, since he was appointed by Trump in 2025, according to reporting by ProPublica.

The oil and gas industry has subtle but distinct opinions on mandatory federal reporting requirements, but most of the major players are united in their efforts to minimize or eliminate methane regulations. For example, some companies have argued that mandatory efforts to measure and control methane pollution were unnecessary because of industry’s existing voluntary efforts. They have pointed to programs such as The Environmental Partnership, an initiative created by API that aims to reduce methane emissions, volatile organic compounds, and flaring (intentionally burning methane in oilfields) across operations.

But an email unearthed by a 2024 congressional investigation revealed the partnership’s true purpose: to delay and minimize federal requirements. “The hope – but far from the certainty – is to stave off future regulation,” Senior BP executive David J. van Hoogstraten wrote, describing the program’s inaugural meeting in 2017.

“This program alone…may not stave off regulation, but it would provide the industry with ammunition to help us better mitigate/mold regulation when it does come,” van Hoogstraten went on. “You begin by doing things voluntarily and then that (and not much more) becomes the regulation.”

BP did not respond to a request for comment and does not appear to have submitted its own public comments to the EPA. It is a member of API.

Other companies have argued in favor of a federal regulatory framework as a way to maintain their own public image, or, in the case of API, to preserve influence in shaping those regulations. Two days after President Biden was inaugurated in 2021, API shifted its internal position to publicly support federal methane regulation, with President Mike Sommers writing in an email to members that “API needs to be at the table as [the Biden administration] quickly shifts in federal regulatory policy.”

A hard swing across the federal policy landscape arrived when President Trump retook the White House. As ProPublica has reported, the oil industry has found a receptive audience for weakening various methane rules in executive branch appointees such as Szabo.

Environmental experts warn that watered-down methane regulations could ultimately lead to a significant undercounting or distortion of U.S. emissions data, to the detriment of American companies overseas. The European Union’s landmark climate law, currently under attack from the U.S. oil lobby, puts pressure on companies over their methane emissions, including to market their products as “lower carbon” or “responsibly sourced.”

“The loss of standardized, robust methane reporting requirements will put U.S. companies at a disadvantage with major trading partners,” Rachel Cleetus with the Union of Concerned Scientists said by email. She added that this could force companies toward expensive, uncertain workarounds, such as third-party verifiers.

Even if certain elements of the methane reporting requirements endure after the Trump administration overhauls the rule, what remains will likely reflect a years-long industry campaign to remake these pollution regulations in its own image.

And that will have serious implications for other federal rules, public health, and the climate.

“Oil and gas CEOs know their business model is the leading cause of preventable death and ill-health in the world today,” said Maibach. “Their callous indifference to humanity is shocking.”

A 2023 study in the British Medical Journal estimated that more than 5 million excess deaths due to air pollution from burning fossil fuels could be avoided by transitioning to renewable energy sources. Those deaths stem from heart disease, the leading killer, as well as stroke and lower respiratory infections, among other causes. 

Preserving the Greenhouse Gas Framework

If the fossil fuel industry is so adamant about weakening efforts to monitor methane emissions, why then does it need the GHGRP?

Parr, the American Gas Association lawyer, reveals some of the logic in his same January 2025 letter to the EPA transition team.

“For years, EPA has compiled and published greenhouse gas (“GHG”) emissions data and analysis that AGA and its members rely on to demonstrate the incredible progress our industry has made in voluntarily reducing methane emissions,” Parr wrote. “AGA encourages EPA to maintain these information repositories.”

The GHGRP tracks detailed emissions data from the largest facilities in the U.S. releasing globe-warming pollutants. The Greenhouse Gas Inventory, an extension of the reporting program, estimates the total emissions — including carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide — across all sectors of the economy. Collectively, the data from these two programs inform municipal, state, and federal-level policies, collaboration with international bodies including the United Nations, and ultimately help the public and policymakers understand both the sources and implications of these emissions.

“For over 15 years, the GHGRP has delivered credible, comparable emissions data,” said Edwin LaMair, Senior Attorney at the Environmental Defense Fund, via email. “Its clear enforceable rules help ensure consistent, reliable data, even as stakeholders debate the accuracy of individual reporting methods and emissions estimates.”

As scrutiny over greenhouse gas emissions has grown over the years, environmental groups, consultants, and — most important to industry—investors, have demanded more transparent emissions and sustainability data from companies. For industry groups, this reporting program is an essential way to meet these growing demands.

“Having the [Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program] and the [Greenhouse Gas Inventory] available as centralized, commonly accepted sources of GHG data allows AGA to proudly and unequivocally demonstrate that U.S. natural gas distribution systems have reduced methane emissions,” Parr wrote in the AGA letter. “Natural gas companies depend on this data to provide information regularly sought by investors, customers, and stakeholders.”

After Trump's EPA announced its potential repeal of the emissions program, API's Sommers criticized the move at the October 2025 Drake Energy Security Summit. "Regulatory certainty is a huge issues for us," he said, adding that companies prefer more stringent regulations over a decade or more of uncertainty -- and he says that reflects their advocacy on this issue. "We want to continue to report. We know how important emissions reduction is for our social license to operate." 

Prior to the Trump administration, the EPA viewed GHGRP as a vital tool for environmental tracking, international trade, regulatory development, and industry credibility, according to internal briefing materials from February 2024. (Document 2)

Notably, satellite and aerial observations suggest that the EPA’s Greenhouse Gas Inventory significantly undercounts methane emissions. A 2024 Stanford-led study estimated that U.S. oil and gas facilities produce, on average, emissions that are three times higher than EPA predictions. By including massive methane releases known as super-emitter events, the revised methane reporting rules would have helped address these shortcomings.

Filling a Data Hole the Size of the U.S.

Across government and industry, many view the greenhouse gas program as an unrivaled collection of climate pollution data.

“While alternative reporting mechanisms exist—including voluntary programs, sector-specific protocols, and state or international approaches—none offers the GHGRP’s comprehensive coverage,” LaMair said. “Repealing the program would weaken efforts by government, communities, academia, and the private sector to understand and reduce the pollution driving climate change.”

In one EPA briefing about the Greenhouse Gas Inventory from 2025, agency staffers expressed concern over outside groups like the Environmental Defense Fund, the World Resources Institute, or the Rhodium Group publishing independent inventories should the GHGRP be shuttered: “Alternative estimates would not have the same level of transparency, peer review, stakeholder inclusion, or documentation.” (Document 3)

The gas industry already has expressed concerns about the effects of reporting its emissions to multiple sources, with varying requirements. In Parr’s letter to the EPA transition team, he wrote that the agency should maintain “primacy” in regulating greenhouse gas emissions, as other federal agencies had become increasingly involved under Biden. Worried that additional regulations would lead to duplicative reporting requirements, he emphasized that a single, robust EPA-led framework was preferable to a “byzantine” system of conflicting mandates.

However, somewhat of an outlier among other major fossil fuel players, fracking billionaire Harold Hamm's company, Continental Resources, and his trade association, the Domestic Energy Producers Alliance — which recently merged with the IPAA — want to see the program eliminated, according to public comments. Others like the Ohio Oil and Gas Association suggested in its comments that the EPA maintain the greenhouse gas program but make it voluntary.

At the University of Texas at Austin, one specialist hopes to lead the charge in creating a rigorous, voluntary “fill-in program” should the EPA dismantle GHGRP completely. At a natural gas methane emissions conference in Virginia this past April, Senior Training Specialist Jen Snyder said she’s been approached by “numerous parties” about creating such a program. The UT Austin Center for Energy and Environmental Systems Analysis is currently developing a “bridge” program called the “Open GHGRP.”

It is unclear what role fossil fuel groups will have in the development of this program. Snyder did not respond to a request for comment.

Impacts of Losing the Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program

Regardless of what exactly might take the place of the GHGRP and related Inventory, experts worry about what the U.S. stands to lose without such a comprehensive system — including, what the nation may miss in understanding a rapidly changing planet.

“Discontinuing the GHGRP would create blind spots in our collective understanding of air quality, greenhouse gas emissions, and climate change,” Kimberly Barrett, a member of the Environmental Data and Governance Initiative, said by email.

Barrett predicts those missing pieces will have major impacts at the state level. Take Texas, for example: “Texas does not have independent greenhouse gas reporting requirements,” she said. But data from the EPA’s program “reveal Texas emits more greenhouse gases than any other state.”

In addition, states from Iowa to North Carolina rely on this program’s data to compile their own mandated, state-level greenhouse gas inventories, according to an EPA internal briefing. The likely resulting inconsistencies, the briefing notes, would “inevitably lead to double-counting and gaps in emissions estimation,” particularly for “mobile sources and fugitive methane emissions.” (Document 3)

The dismantling of the U.S. reporting program could, once again, put companies at a disadvantage in international markets. For instance, the European Union’s methane regulations, intended to reduce climate pollution, require high-quality, verified carbon intensity data for imports. Without these programs, the EPA argues in that same internal briefing, the U.S. could also lose a source of leverage and an economic edge.

“The rigor and transparency of the Inventory has made it possible for the U.S. to pressure trade competitors such as China, India and Brazil to disclose their emissions and ensure valid comparisons of performance across countries,” the draft labeled “DELIBERATIVE - DO NOT CITE” reads. (Document 3)

As the Trump administration weighs how it ultimately will reshape the reporting program and its methane provision, the world’s largest oil companies have earned $93 billion in quarterly profits amid war, record-breaking heatwaves, and devastating wildfires fueled by climate change.

“This administration is completely beholden to protecting the interests of fossil fuel companies, even as these companies are raking in massive profits and their profits are causing enormously costly climate damages to communities across the world,” said Cleetus.

Ashley Braun contributed reporting for this story.