The State of Montana believes something stinks about a new methane rule from the Bureau of Land Management.

"The U.S. Bureau of Land Management has proposed a rule to regulate methane flaring and venting from oil and natural gas extraction," said Montana Attorney General’s Office spokesman Eric Sell. "As a land management agency the BLM has no legal authority to regulate air quality issues, so what the State of Montana has done is join the State of Wyoming in challenging this ruling in federal court."

There are two major issues that prompted the lawsuit.

"One, BLM doesn't have the legal authority to adopt these rules, and two, it is rather duplicative, the states already regulate this type of stuff, so really it just creates more compliance costs for industry and doesn't really produce a lot of environmental benefit."

The state of Montana joined the lawsuit on Friday, Sell says it is unclear when the state will receive a decision from the court.

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