Regulatory Uncertainty and New Source Performance Standards on Methane

June 2022
Citation:
52
ELR 10453
Issue
6
Author
Sebastián Luengo Troncoso

Recent U.S. presidential administrations have been the apex of what scholars have identified as “the rise of executive-level power, the use of the ‘administrative presidency,’ and the growing democratic deficit.” Indeed, with legislative gridlock in the U.S. Congress that seems to have no end in sight, the use of agencies in the executive branch has been adopted by both political parties as the main vehicle of policymaking. This Comment acknowledges the ongoing regulatory uncertainty in the United States, categorizes it, and explores theoretical frameworks for presidential transitions. It then specifically analyzes the new source performance standards on methane for oil and gas to exemplify how this regulatory uncertainty, caused by consecutive, diametrically opposed rollbacks of national policies, produces devastating impacts for the whole regulated sector, including its inability to adopt long-term climate change measures.

Sebastián Luengo Troncoso is a UNEP-Georgetown Global Environment and Sustainability Law Fellow and S.J.D. candidate at Georgetown University. He holds LL.M. degrees from Georgetown and from Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile.

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