CALIFORNIA/CLIMATE CHANGE/EPA/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT: “Gov. Jerry Brown used the spotlight of a global climate change conference to excoriate the Trump administration for rolling back restrictions on releasing methane, calling the reversal ‘insane.’ ‘It borders on criminality,’ Brown said to applause from an international audience of climate experts and government officials gathered in San Francisco. As the White House has weakened environmental policies, California has charged in the opposite direction – and Brown has often played the role of both a champion of his state’s path and a vocal antagonist of the White House. When California sued over the administration’s effort to blunt reductions in vehicle emissions, Brown branded then- Environmental Protection Agency chief Scott Pruitt ‘outlaw Pruitt.’ More recently, when Washington moved to revoke California’s authority to set more stringent emissions standards, Brown vowed to ‘fight this stupidity in every conceivable way.’ Continuing its efforts to erode Obama-era environmental laws, the EPA is poised to dilute a requirement that energy companies check for methane leaking from new wells. The walkback is expected to result in hundreds of thousands of additional tons of methane flowing into the atmosphere. Noting that methane is one of the more potent greenhouse gases – meaning that its release would accelerate the effects of climate change – Brown called the move ‘the most obvious and dangerous and irresponsible action by Mr. Trump.’”
–Jeremy B. White, “Gov. Brown: Trump administration’s rollback of methane rules ‘insane’,” Politico, September 11, 2018 1:19 pm