The Trump Administration plans to weaken Biden-era regulations on oil and gas sources of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, the EPA announced this week.

Fossil fuel industry members attending a conference in Santa Fe were the first to hear about plans to give oil and gas companies a break on the methane standards. EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin told attendees about the coming move at a closed-door meeting of the New Mexico Oil and Gas Association. The meeting drew protests from environmental and community groups, led by the Sierra Club’s Rio Grande chapter.

In a Wednesday press release, Zeldin said the 2024 rule to limit methane pollution from existing oil and gas sources is “unworkable” and “holding back American energy dominance.” He did not mention that the U.S. is the world’s largest oil and natural gas producer and is currently extracting more oil than any country at any time in human history. The U.S. is also the world’s top natural gas exporter and this year became the world's top oil exporter.

Methane is the second most abundant human-caused greenhouse gas after CO2, accounting for about 16 percent of global emissions. It is also more than 28 times as potent as CO2 at trapping heat in the atmosphere. Oil and natural gas systems are the largest source of methane in the U.S., responsible for 32 percent of emissions, according to the EPA.