WASHINGTON— The Center for Biological Diversity joined environmental and public health groups in a legal motion today asking a federal court to stop President Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency from delaying critical limits on super-polluting methane and other pollution from oil and gas operations.

On July 31, the EPA issued a rule delaying by 18 months deadlines for companies to reduce emissions of methane and volatile organic compounds from their fossil fuel extraction operations. The rule took effect immediately, without first receiving public input. Environmental groups sued the Trump administration the same day.

“It’s outrageous that Trump’s EPA is delaying these lifesaving, climate-protecting pollution limits without giving people a chance to weigh in,” said Maggie Coulter, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity’s Climate Law Institute. “Rather than hold Big Oil accountable for its pollution, the Trump administration is forcing people to breathe dangerous chemicals and suffer the harms of an overheating climate. I’m hopeful the court will step in to protect our air and give Americans a voice on this important health issue.”

The EPA cited requests from industry as the reason for delaying these compliance deadlines.

The Biden administration established the deadlines last year for leak detection and repair requirements and to end routine gas flaring. The EPA also plans to delay a reporting system for significant “super emitter” events and delaying the deadline for states to submit plans for reducing methane emissions.

The EPA admits that delaying these critical safeguards against some of the nation’s largest sources of air pollution would harm public health and the climate. Delaying these protections would result in an additional 1.3 million tons of methane emissions; 350,000 tons of volatile organic compounds, or VOCs; and 13,000 tons of toxic air pollution.

A recent study found that roughly two-thirds of the supposed cuts in greenhouse gas emissions over the past two decades have been wiped out by higher methane emissions from the fossil gas industry.