A Statement on Pennsylvania's Finalized Air Quality Standard for the Control of VOC Emissions from Oil and Natural Gas Sources.

This standard will be presented to PA DEP’s Air Quality Technical Advisory Committee on Thursday December 9, 2021

The Evangelical Environmental Network remains extremely disappointed in the final VOC Rule developed by the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection. The final standard ignored the comments of 28,596 pro-life Christians who recommended including the major source of methane leaks, low producing wells, and sought better and more frequent well inspections. By not including our critical requests, the regulation will do little to defend our children’s health and result in minimal—at best—improvements to our Commonwealth’s already failing air quality.

Our best hope for defending our kids from increased smog and the associated asthma attacks lies in the new standards already proposed by The Environmental Protection Agency. Unfortunately, those rules are at least a year away, another year for dirty air to threaten our children.

The Rev. Mitchell C. Hescox

President/C.E.O.