The White House’s regulatory agenda landed Thursday, solidifying plans for rules that could boost the oil and gas industry and laying out a timeline for offshore carbon storage regulations.
The spring Unified Agenda offers the latest look at the Trump administration’s efforts to expand domestic energy production — while not providing a deadline for standards for carbon dioxide pipelines.
During the first seven-plus months of the Trump administration, officials have focused on jettisoning initiatives advanced under former President Joe Biden that sought to impose more requirements on fossil fuel businesses.
In a series of executive orders, President Donald Trump has taken aim at Biden’s moves to address climate change and expand conservation in states like Alaska, replacing them with policies intended to maximize the use of oil and gas.
The Trump administration’s new Unified Agenda provides a blueprint for what to expect from key departments and agencies in the months ahead.
Interior on oil and gas
The Trump administration firmed up a series of proposed regulation changes, walking back environmental requirements for oil and gas producers and allowing more harassment of marine animals by the industry. Federal law prohibits the “take” of protected species, a term that includes killing or harassing animals. Harassment refers to a range of actions that can disturb or injure animals, and some unintentional harassment is allowed under the law.
One rule, set to be proposed in October, would undo rules dating from the Biden administration to require insurance companies keep more money on hand for oil and gas lease cleanup onshore. The Biden-era rule had also sought to reduce conflicts with wildlife and recreators by focusing oil and gas leasing in areas likely to produce substantial amounts of oil and gas.
Other efforts from the Interior Department allow more harassment by oil and gas players of polar bears and walruses in the Southern Beaufort Sea and northern sea otters near Kodiak, Alaska, and Seward, Alaska. The polar bear and walrus rule took effect in June, while the sea otters rule is set to be finalized in October.
Interior didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on the Unified Agenda.
The department also plans in December to announce updates to oil spill cleanup rules — the first updates to the regulations in 22 years. Interior wrote that the changes would “streamline the oil spill response planning requirements,” saying it expects a comment period on the proposal to be open until February.
Offshore carbon storage
Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement are slated to release a proposed rule next May to regulate offshore carbon dioxide storage.
In the 2021 bipartisan infrastructure law, Congress opened the outer continental shelf to CO2 storage — directing Interior to finish the rule by November 2022. Last fall, BOEM pointed to the complexities involved in crafting a new regulatory program.
Observers at the time said Interior was likely prioritizing other policy areas, including the permitting of offshore wind.
The comment period on the notice of proposed rulemaking would end in July 2026.
Christian Flinn, public policy manager for the Carbon Capture Coalition — a group that works to build federal policy support for carbon management — said the organization is eager for the agencies to release the offshore CO2 storage rule.
“While we understand that several competing priorities have delayed this effort, we want to emphasize the rule is critical for industry to be able to move forward with CO2 storage” in the outer continental shelf, Flinn said in a statement, a reference to submerged lands offshore.
BOEM and BSEE couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.
Pipelines and forests
In the final days of the Biden administration, the Transportation Department’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA) released a notice of proposed rulemaking meant to strengthen safety standards for carbon dioxide pipelines.
The Biden-era proposal would have covered pipelines with CO2 in gaseous, liquid or supercritical phases, aiming to address a loophole that could have left some lines unregulated. To date, CO2 has been moved primarily in the supercritical phase, described by DOE as “a fluid state” of CO2 where it’s “held at or above” its critical temperature and pressure.
However, the rule wasn’t published in the Federal Register and now the proposal, listed in the fall 2024 Unified Agenda, does not appear in the spring 2025 agenda.
In an email, PHMSA spokesperson Emily Wong said the rule for CO2 pipeline safety and another for gas pipeline leak detection and repair programs weren’t omitted from the spring 2025 regulatory agenda — but are now in the “long-term actions” stage of rulemaking.
“Congress directed PHMSA to complete rulemakings on gas pipeline leak detection and repair programs and standards for gas phase transportation of carbon dioxide, and the agency will issue those rules as required,” Wong said in an email Thursday.
On Thursday, Erin Sutherland, policy and program director at Pipeline Safety Trust, said the nonprofit group is “deeply disappointed that PHMSA has failed to include the carbon dioxide pipeline safety rulemaking on its regulatory docket.”
“With mileage likely to increase in the years ahead, these pipelines pose unique and severe dangers, and communities will be left unprotected if the agency continues to delay action,” Sutherland said in a statement. “PHMSA has a responsibility to act now before more mileage is built and more people are put at risk.”
Andy Black, CEO of the Liquid Energy Pipeline Association (LEPA), said CO2 pipelines have a strong safety record. He also recommended that PHMSA “update CO2 pipeline regulations to incorporate lessons learned from past incidents as new infrastructure proposals are reviewed.”
Black also noted existing regulations for CO2 pipelines, pointing POLITICO’s E&E News to a LEPA fact sheet.
PHMSA’s Wong said the agency oversees roughly 5,300 miles of CO2 pipelines moving CO2 in a supercritical phase, noting that the agency’s “accident data show one serious incident and no fatalities in the last 20 years.”
A PHMSA rule on leak detection and repair for natural gas pipelines also didn’t appear in the spring 2025 Unified Agenda, Pipeline Safety Trust noted.
Another regulation that didn’t appear in the new agenda: a rule that would have opened the door to CO2 storage underneath national forests and grasslands.
The rule, put forward by the Forest Service in November 2023, would have exempted carbon capture and storage from an existing agency prohibition on the use of forest system land.
“Clarifying regulatory procedures on federal lands is critical to providing developers access to domestic CO2 storage capacity that aligns with anticipated increases in demand for appropriate CO2 storage over the coming years,” the Carbon Capture Coalition’s Flinn said in a statement Thursday.
The fall 2024 agenda indicated that a final decision would be made on the rule by this month.
The Forest Service is part of the Agriculture Department, which sent a comment to E&E News on carbon capture.
“The Carbon Capture and Storage exemption is not currently listed on the unified agenda as its status is ‘inactive,'” an unnamed USDA spokesperson said in a statement. “No further action will be taken until it is removed from that status.”
