A federal judge in Wyoming on Wednesday blocked Interior Department rules setting stricter standards for hydraulic fracturing on public lands, the second set of major regulations from the Obama administration to be faulted in court in as many months. U.S. District Judge Scott Skavdahl issued a preliminary injunction barring implementation of the rules, saying the Interior Department lacked the authority to issue them. The rules , issued by department’s Bureau of Land Management in March, apply to oil and gas drilling on federal lands, which produce 11% of the natural gas consumed in the U.S. and 5% of the oil, according to government data. Much of this drilling is concentrated in Western states, such as Colorado and Wyoming, two of the states challenging the standards. More than 90% of new land-based wells in the U.S. use hydraulic fracturing, known as fracking. “Congress has not authorized or delegated to the […]