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March 21 (UPI) -- Texas has joined 15 other states in suing to block the Biden administration's ban on approving applications to export liquefied natural gas exports, state Attorney General Ken Paxton announced Thursday. The lawsuit argues the federal government lacks the authority to broadly deny those permits.
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President Joe Biden said the pause will allow officials to review the economic and environmental impacts of projects seeking to export LNG to Europe and Asia where the fuel is in high demand.
Experts say the pause threatens the future of more than a dozen LNG export terminals planned for the Gulf of Mexico coast and has caused widespread concern among environmentalist groups and some local residents.
One analysis reports that if all proposed gas export projects were to ship gas overseas, they would result in 3.2 billion tons of greenhouse gases -- equivalent to the entire emissions of the European Union.
"This pause on new LNG approvals sees the climate crisis for what it is - the existential threat of our time," Biden said when he announced the pause in January.
Louisiana has also filed suit against the ban. It claims the move will harm the economy and undermine efforts to supply foreign allies in Europe with steady supplies of LNG as the region seeks to rely less on piped natural gas from Russia.
Texas is the nation's leading producer of both crude oil and natural gas.
"Biden's unilateral decree disregards statutory mandates, flouts the legal process, upends the oil and gas industry, disrupts the Texas economy and subverts our constitutional structure," Paxton said in the Texas suit.
"The ban will drive billions of dollars in investment away from Texas, hinder our ability to maximize revenue for public schools, force Texas producers to flare excess natural gas instead of taking it to market, and annihilate critical jobs."
