Giving Compass' Take:

• As the EPA rolls back rules preventing the release of methane, oil companies like BP and Shell don’t want to give up the little bit of green cred they get from preventing one kind of emission.

• How can donors and policymakers help promote clean energy right now?

• Here's why California is calling for increased regulations on the oil industry. 

When the Trump administration announced its plans to roll back regulations that cut methane pollution—a greenhouse gas more potent than CO2—from oil and gas companies, even some oil and gas companies said that they didn’t want that to happen.

Exxon asked the EPA to maintain parts of the Obama-era policy. The president of BP America argued that “regulating methane is the right thing to do for the planet.” Shell told the administration it wanted methane emissions to be regulated. But on Thursday, the EPA went ahead with its plan anyway.

In part, oil and gas companies want regulations because natural gas, often touted as a “bridge” fuel that is cleaner than other fossil fuels, is in danger of fully losing whatever amount of green cred it had. When it’s burned, natural gas is far cleaner than coal. But when it’s produced, methane leaks are a major source of pollution. When methane gets into the atmosphere, it traps more heat than carbon dioxide—as much as 80 times more over the first couple of decades that it’s in the air. The technology exists to avoid most of those emissions.

“Companies like Exxon and Shell recognize that the reputation of natural gas is at risk here,” says Lila Holzman, an energy program manager at the nonprofit As You Sow, which works on issues related to corporate climate emissions. “If it’s perceived that because of intense methane leakage, natural gas cannot play a role in the low-carbon future, that impacts their business.”

Read the full article about oil companies and pollution by Adele Peters at Fast Company.