A recent agreement between an environmental group and an oil and gas company that dramatically cuts excess oilfield pollution at a facility in southern New Mexico could be a model both for quicker resolutions to pollution violations and a legal roadmap for private groups looking to hold fossil fuel companies to account under the Clean Air Act.
In late September, WildEarth Guardians entered into a consent decree with a branch of the multinational Oxy USA for regularly exceeding permitted emission limits of lung-damaging air pollutants at an oil and gas pumping and compressor station northeast of Carlsbad, New Mexico. In its suit, the environmental group claimed that the releases were so frequent that they couldn’t possibly be accidents or malfunctions but a part of the company’s normal operating procedure and a violation of its state-issued air pollution permit.
