"Court: Trump Admin Must Enforce Obama Methane Leak Rule"

"The Trump administration must start enforcing an Obama administration rule limiting methane leaks from oil and natural gas drilling on federal land, a court ruled.

In the late Thursday decision, Judge William Orrick of the District Court for the District of Northern California, granted a preliminary injunction against the Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management (BLM), blocking a November action that tried to delay enforcement of the Obama rule for one year.

“The BLM’s reasoning behind the Suspension Rule is untethered to evidence contradicting the reasons for implementing the Waste Prevention Rule, and so plaintiffs are likely to prevail on the merits,” Orrick, who was appointed to the bench by former President Obama, wrote in the ruling."

Timothy Cama reports for The Hill February 23, 2018.