The Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Region 6 department is conducting helicopter flyovers over the Permian Basin to identify “super-emitters” of methane gas among oil and gas operations, according to an Aug. 1 news release.
The flyovers will use infrared cameras to inspect hundreds of oil and gas activities in the Permian Basin region of West Texas and southeast New Mexico until Aug. 15, according to the press release. The agency hopes to use aerial surveillance to identify large emitters of methane and excessive volatile organic compound (VOC), emitted as gases from certain solids or liquids which may cause adverse health effects, as well as address any noncompliance indicated by the flyovers through EPA administrative enforcement actions and referrals to the Department of Justice (DOJ).
“It’s just a way to intimidate the oil and gas industry,” Steve Milloy, member of former President Donald Trump’s EPA transition team, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “The EPA’s conduct is outrageous.”…
“Biden’s EPA is doing everything to make gas prices higher,” Milloy said…
“There’s no place in the United States where air quality threatens anybody’s health, even the worst air quality may technically violate EPA standards, but none of that is a health risk,” Milloy stated.
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