SACRAMENTO—On January 27, the California State Assembly held an oversight hearing to consider the sustainability and safety of California’s oil extraction industry in light of massive spills at Chevron’s Cymric oil field in Kern County over the last few years, according to a press release from the Last Chance Alliance.
“We have a real opportunity to move California into a new direction, away from a dying, extractive economy toward one that protects our communities and our climate,” said Ingrid Brostrom, assistant director of the Center on Race, Poverty & the Environment. “Nowhere else in the world allows for industrial oil operations in such close proximity to densely populated urban areas.
“California must do better to achieve our climate goals and protect communities, especially communities of color already overburdened with pollution across our state. We urge the State Assembly to enact sensible measures, like a 2,500 ft. health and safety buffer around extraction sites, to protect families and our environment,” said Brostrom.
The alliance pointed out that one spill leaked more than 50 million gallons of crude oil into the surrounding area. Chevron employed a controversial, extreme extraction technique known as cyclic steaming at the site, where steam is injected below the earth’s surface under high pressure to break up formations and access hard-to-reach heavy crude.
Yet earlier in the year, California’s oil industry regulator adopted weaker restrictions on the practice, allowing for higher injection pressures that make these operations even more dangerous, the alliance said.
“As California grapples with the contradiction between setting forward-thinking climate goals, and maintaining its robust oil extraction industry, yesterday’s hearing marks the latest step in addressing the longstanding threats to the environment and public health associated with in-state extraction. Advocates representing frontline communities most suffering the impacts of California’s fossil fuel industry highlighted the threats facing communities living near oil and gas extraction sites during the hearing,” the alliance said.
“For decades California has rolled out the red carpet for the oil industry while these companies have trashed our air, water, health and climate,” said Kassie Siegel, director of the Center for Biological Diversity’s Climate Law Institute. “It’s time for Gov. Newsom and the legislature to protect Californians by completely phasing out dirty oil extraction in our state. The state can’t claim to be a leader in protecting our environment until it does so.”
The increase in oil and gas drilling permits in recent years — and fact that California currently has no health and safety setbacks like many other states do — is a result of the millions of dollars every year that WSPA and oil companies spend every year on lobbying state officials, including the Governor’s Office and state regulatory agencies, as well as the many millions spent by the oil industry on campaign contributions to politicians and campaign committees.
Both the Jerry Brown and Gavin Newsom administrations expanded oil and gas drilling in California in recent years. The Brown administration approved 21,000 new or reworked well permits and Newsom’s regulators had approved over 4,049 new or reworked permits as of November 4, 2019. In addition, state regulators, while opposing new offshore drilling leases in federal waters off California, have increased offshore drilling permits in state waters under existing leases.
It is no surprise that the Western States Petroleum Association (WSPA), the largest and most powerful corporate lobbying group in California, placed first in the annual lobbying “competition” in California in 2019 with $8.8 million spent on influencing legislators, the Governor’s office and other state officials, a position it captures most years.
The San Ramon-based Chevron spent the third most money on lobbying in California last year, spending a total of $5.9 million.
When you add the $8.8 million from WSPA and the $5.9 million from Chevron, that comes to a total of $14.7 million spent of lobbying between the two oil industry giants.
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