Here we go again. And again.

This week, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) sent the White House another proposed reconsideration of federal methane standards for the oil and gas industry. Across the federal government, the Trump administration is moving to undo rules governing methane waste from oil and gas operations. We don’t know exactly what EPA plans to change yet, but the proposal arrives just as the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is preparing to scrap its own rules meant to stop the waste of taxpayer-owned natural gas on federal lands.

Any methane, the largest component of natural gas, extracted from federal land belongs to all American taxpayers. Unfortunately, instead of being captured, brought to market, and sold, massive quantities of this valuable energy resource have been routinely wasted for decades due to outdated regulations. Methane keeps Slipping Through [Our] Fingers through equipment leaks, intentional venting (release) into the atmosphere, or flaring (burning off) at drill sites.

This is a classic lose-lose-lose scenario. Taxpayers are robbed of millions in royalty revenues, consumers are denied a marketable domestic energy resource, and nearby communities have to deal with long-term public health impacts associated with methane emissions. Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! a break!

The federal government did try to close the valve on this government-sanctioned gas giveaway. In March 2024, BLM, the agency responsible for managing the federal oil and gas program, finalized a long-overdue, commonsense rule to curb the egregious waste of natural gas. This finally updated regulations that had been in place since 1979, before modern fracking even existed.

The 2024 rule wasn’t perfect but, When All Is Said And Done, at least it had teeth. It required operators to submit “waste minimization plans” showing how they actually intended to capture all of the gas they produced. It restricted how much gas could be flared off “royalty-free” by more clearly defining what constitutes an “unavoidable” loss. It required operators to develop Rapid Leak Detection and Repair programs to regularly inspect their equipment and promptly fix leaks, along with reporting and recordkeeping requirements for all vented and flared gas.

These reforms were critical for preventing the waste of valuable, taxpayer-owned natural gas and ensuring taxpayers a fair return from its production.

But old habits, and lucrative industry loopholes, die hard.

Last fall, the Administration signaled its intent to gut these commonsense reforms. The first shoe dropped in November 2025, when BLM announced it was delaying two vital parts of the 2024 rule by a full year. But the delay was just the appetizer. Fast forward to this summer, and BLM announced a new proposed rule that would, for the most part, rescind the 2024 rule, rolling back the clock and reverting to outdated policies that caused this egregious waste in the first place.

If finalized, this new rule would completely eliminate the requirement for operators to create waste minimization plans, loosen requirements on what are considered unavoidable losses, and scrap the Leak Detection and Repair requirements altogether. The proposed rule would significantly increase the volume of methane that operators are allowed to flare off without paying a dime in royalties.

That’s why TCS submitted comments urging BLM not to turn back the clock on methane waste.

That would reverse some encouraging recent trends. Over the past five years, the total volume of lost gas has decreased steadily while federal oil production skyrocketed, meaning oil and gas operators are venting and flaring less while producing more. Rolling back reforms risks a return to routine venting and flaring that has wasted billions of cubic feet of taxpayer-owned natural gas year after year.

And we are talking about a lot of gas.

Over the last decade, operators reported venting, flaring, or otherwise losing 209 billion cubic feet of natural gas from leases on federal lands, with an estimated value of $658 million. As an added sting, much of this methane was vented and flared without being charged a royalty, meaning oil and gas operators didn’t pay taxpayers for wasting our resources. Assuming the current rate of 12.5%, taxpayers should have received $82 million in royalty revenue from this wasted gas. Instead, they only received around $53 million, leaving nearly $29 million in unrealized revenue.

Mamma Mia! Turning back the clock on these reforms could mean that consumers will see greater losses of a valuable energy source and taxpayers will see greater losses of forgone revenue.

So why do oil and gas companies continue to burn and leak a product they could sell? The simple answer: Money, Money, Money. It can be cheaper to release than capture. Ninety-four percent of the methane waste we see today comes from flaring, especially flaring of associated gas that comes from oil wells. Crude oil is significantly more profitable than natural gas. So instead of investing the time and capital required to build the pipeline infrastructure necessary to capture and transport the co-mingled natural gas, it can be faster and cheaper for operators to just light it on fire or vent it into the air so they can turn a profit quicker.

We don’t fault industry for prioritizing profit. That’s just The Name of the Game. The problem is federal policy that keeps changing the rules and failing taxpayers in the process. BLM is proposing to undo reforms adopted just two years ago, while EPA is now reconsidering its own methane standards as well. Why invest in capturing gas if federal policy keeps changing the rules of the game?

Cost-effective methane mitigation technologies exist, but operators have little incentive to Take A Chance [On Me] and make the investment when they are forced to compete with operators who choose not to.

BLM has the responsibility and obligation to prevent the waste of publicly owned energy resources and to ensure a fair return for taxpayers. Loosening requirements on venting and flaring is a blatant failure of that mandate. Responsible energy development is not just about pumping out more oil. It means getting the full value out of all our domestic energy resources, not squandering them through preventable, routine waste.

Reversing course on commonsense policies that curtail methane waste is a massive step backward. Lost royalties deprive the Treasury of much-needed revenue, wasted natural gas undercuts the domestic energy supply, and that leaked, vented, and flared gas imposes immediate and long-term public health costs on our communities. As ABBA would say, The Winner Takes It All. Let’s make sure the American taxpayer isn’t left standing small.