with Paulina Firozi

THE LIGHTBULB

The Trump administration has done a lot for oil and natural gas firms. But behind closed doors, they worry that the Trump team's inexperience may ultimately end up jeopardizing its efforts to wipe climate rules off the books. 

Industry lawyer Mark Barron, at a a private meeting of oil and gas executives in Colorado Springs, openly worried that the courts might ultimately throw out key parts of the Trump administration's deregulatory agenda under challenge by environmental groups. 

“The current [Interior Secretary, David Bernhardt] is a competent technocrat but the other folks who are in the office are inexperienced government folks,” Barron said, referring to political appointees at key agencies, according to a recording obtained by The Post’s Juliet Eilperin. 

“And so they may want to implement policy, but at some point, you need people who are familiar with Washington, who know how to draft a regulatory rule, who have experience doing it on a big level," said Barron, who heads the energy litigation arm of Baker Hostetler, at the June 24 meeting of the Independent Petroleum Association of America. 

IPAA, which represents small and midsize oil and gas companies, has publicly been one of the biggest backers of the Trump administration’s rollbacks aimed at curbing methane leaks, protecting endangered species and other issues.

But privately, Barron echoed an observation of many outside the oil and gas business: The administration’s rush to write regulations has left it vulnerable to courtroom challenges. 

“I'm going to be candid; some of those recissions were done by too few people and at too fast a pace,” Barron said.

And Democratic state attorneys general and environmental groups have been eager to exploit those weaknesses. The Trump administration has won only two of the 27 cases brought by states and environmental groups over environmental regulations as of the end of August, according to an analysis of the Institute for Policy Integrity.

Kathleen C. Schroder, a partner at Davis, Graham and Stubbs, was less critical of the Trump administration’s rulemaking approach at the IPAA meeting. But she did note that some rollbacks could create confusion among staff overseeing oil and gas leasing.

In June, the White House Council on Environmental Quality sought to reverse an Obama-era climate policy, telling agencies they no longer have to take a project’s long-term climate impacts into account when assessing how it will affect the environment.

The guidance “just doesn’t have enough teeth,” Schroder said. And legal teeth, she added, would make it easier for lawyers to defend a federal leasing decision in court.

“And it’s not helpful in the sense of what the agency needs to know, when it does its climate change analysis is, literally, ‘What do I do?’ ”

Asked about the session, both Schroder and a spokeswoman at Baker Hostetler declined to comment further.

POWER PLAYS

— Climate protestors to flood Washington streets again:  The coalition of advocacy groups that blocked major streets during the morning commute in DC this week are returning for another rally to draw attention to the climate crisis. The demonstrators planned to gather in McPherson Square on Friday morning, The Post’s Justin Wm. Moyer reports. “Since we Shut Down DC on Monday, the U.S. Government has shown no indication that it will act on climate,” organizers said in a statement. “As a result, the Coalition to Shut Down DC will disrupt business-as-usual in the nation’s capital again.”

— Trump vs. California: Officials in California pushed back on accusations in the letter from the Trump administration that warned the state is “failing to meet its obligations” to protect the environment.

  • California leaders say it's inaccurate: “Jared Blumenfeld, the secretary of the California Environmental Protection Agency, said the EPA’s letter contained numerous inaccuracies, including its description of San Francisco’s wastewater treatment system and its catalog of alleged violations,” the Los Angeles Times reports. “I wouldn’t want anyone to get the impression that all the environmental issues in California have been solved,” Blumenfeld said. “But we spend a huge amount of money and time and effort, and the federal government’s portion of that is relatively small.”
  • They also rejected the link between the homelessness and pollution: “I’m sick of this president taking swipes at our city for no reason other than politics,” San Francisco Mayor London Breed (D) said in a statement. “As I’ve said before, there are no needles washing out to the bay or ocean from our sewer system, and there is no relationship between homelessness and water quality in San Francisco. It’s just not a real issue.”

— Democratic governors press for climate action on sidelines of U.N. summit: "Six governors in the U.S. Climate Alliance have been in Midtown Manhattan this week conferring with presidents, prime ministers and foreign government officials responsible for climate issues," reports The Post's Carol Morello.

  • How the group formed: The alliance of governors formed in 2017 after Trump said he would withdraw from the Paris climate accord. 
  • What they are doing now: While the group of governors, most of them Democrats, insist they are not conducting a form of shadow diplomacy, they still want the world to know "there is still intelligent life in the United States taking action on climate change,” Washington Gov. Jay Inslee (D), a co-founder of the Climate Alliance. "They have often been assisted by former U.S. officials who worked on climate policy in the Obama administration and joined nonprofit environmental groups after their positions were eliminated," writes Morello.

— Trump wants acting FEMA head to lead: The White House said Trump plans to tap Peter Gaynor, the deputy administrator for the Federal Emergency Management Agency who has led in an acting capacity since March, to permanently lead the agency. “The White House withdrew its previous nominee, Jeffrey Byard, earlier this month after his Senate confirmation landed in jeopardy over an accusation he was involved in an altercation,” Politico reports, citing a White House official. “Gaynor’s nomination, which was widely expected, comes after the former Rhode Island Emergency Management Agency director recently oversaw the federal response to Hurricane Dorian.”

— A group of scientists from disbanded EPA panel will meet anyway: A group of scientists that were fired from advisory roles by the Trump administration will convene at a meeting hosted by the Union of Concerned Scientists. The panel, which will assemble next month a year after the EPA disbanded the Particulate Matter Review Panel, includes 20 experts that will continue their research on air pollution from particulate matter and make recommendations to the agency.

  • Why they're doing it: “This isn’t just politics,” Gretchen Goldman, a research director at the Union of Concerned Scientists wrote on Twitter. "For decades, under both democratic and republican administrations, EPA has preserved a process that ensures the best available science informs air pollution protections. This administration is tearing it down."
  • What the EPA says: In a statement to the Hill, an EPA spokesman said the agency “always welcomes comments from the public and it is not uncommon for special interest groups and coalitions to organize, meet and develop comments for submission to the record. EPA will continue to take into consideration these comments that meet our scientific standards.”

— Another bipartisan carbon pricing bill: Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) introduced a bill that aims to bring down carbon emissions by eliminating the gas tax and implementing a fee on carbon emissions to boost funding to invest in infrastructure. Fitzpatrick had previously introduced the bill, called the Market Choice Act, with former Rep. Carlos Curbelo (R-Fla.).

  • Environmental groups applauded the effort: Climate Citizens Lobby praised the lawmakers for “working in a bipartisan manner to move climate solutions forward.” The Environmental Defense Fund called it a “serious proposal and would result in important infrastructure investments across the country.”
  • The co-sposors: They are Reps. Salud Carbajal (D-Calif.), Francis Rooney (R-Fla.) and Scott Peters (D-Calif.).

— Here’s another effort that could be delayed by an impeachment inquiry: A pending deal meant to bolster demand for ethanol and biodiesel could be stalled by the impeachment battle consuming Washington, biofuel industry sources tell Reuters. “Two weeks ago, Trump met with biofuel officials, farm- and oil-state senators and oil refining executives to hash out the details of a ‘giant package’ related to ethanol that he had promised in August,” per the report. “While the groups seemed to be on the cusp of an agreement, Trump now finds himself mired in an intensifying partisan fight that could monopolize his attention for weeks, if not months.”

THERMOMETER

Scientists studying plant species in the Savannah River Site discovered that habitat corridors improve biodiversity and reduce extinction rates. (Brad Herring)

— The largest habitat corridor experiment in the world: A new study has found that stitching together fractured habitats could have long-term benefits for wildlife, The Post’s Ben Guarino reports. Michigan State University ecologist Nick M. Haddad found strips of undeveloped or restored land that connect isolated habitats are “the most viable path toward real conservation for biodiversity.” “Biodiversity bloomed in the experimentally linked habitats. Fewer local plants went extinct. The plant richness — the number of species — swelled each year. After 18 years, an average of 24 more plant species grew in connected habitats vs. disconnected fragments, an increase of 14 percent,” Guarino writes.

— Man, it’s a hot one: The National Weather Service’s Climate Prediction Center is signaling there will be unusually warm weather through the beginning of October at least in many eastern U.S. locations. “Many cities in the southeast and Mid-Atlantic have seen less than a quarter inch of rain this month and are experiencing one of their driest Septembers on record. Not only is that causing drought conditions to intensify and expand, but the drier ground is easier to heat up — which makes temperatures head even higher. It’s a vicious self-reinforcing cycle,” The Post’s Matthew Cappucci and Jason Samenow report. “…As the climate continues to warm, heat domes such as the one predicted over the next week are expected to become more intense. That keeps summerlike weather around deeper into the fall, and data show that this is already happening.”

DAYBOOK

Today

  • The Association of Energy Engineers’ World Energy Expo and Conference continues.

 

EXTRA MILEAGE

— From The Post's Tom Toles: