New York Governor Walks Back Methane Accounting Change Plan (1)

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul’s administration said on Wednesday it won’t keep pushing a bid to change the way the state counts emissions of the potent greenhouse gas methane, a move that opponents say would have weakened the state’s climate plan.

Under the accounting change Hochul (D) backed, New York would extend the timeframe for measuring methane releases from a 20-year timescale to a 100-year scale. Methane has a shorter life in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide, but is more than 80 times more potent in the first 20 years.

The shift to a 100-year timeframe would water down the ...