New York Gov. Kathy Hochul on Wednesday walked back a proposal to weaken the state’s landmark climate law in the face of significant public pressure on the issue. The proposed changes, included in a budget proposal and made public just days before a key budget deadline, would have altered the timeline on which greenhouse gas, especially methane, pollution is calculated. Methane, the main component in so-called “natural” gas traps more than 80 times more heat in the atmosphere than CO2 over a 20 year time frame. The Hochul-backed proposal would have used what critics derided as “magic math” to downplay the climate impact of methane — to the benefit of the gas industry. (New York Times $, Politico, New York Daily News, Albany Times Union, Bloomberg Law $, Spectrum Local News, Crain’s New York Business, New York Post)