By Katie Davis
Marchers gathered at the Crowne Plaza to oppose a SoCalGas plan. It was sponsoring a public meeting on alternatives to replace the Ventura Compressor plant. It was the sixth meeting the company held in the city of Ventura to air various alternatives. Opponents say it’s too dangerous at its current location across the street from the (Photo by John Brooks of CFROG) Boys and Girls Club and an elementary school.
From March 29 to April 2nd SoCalGas held a series of public forums to share a “Feasibility Study” of options for their planned replacement and expansion of a Ventura Compressor Station that pushes natural gas through their pipe system out to the La Goleta gas storage field near UCSB in Santa Barbara County.
The Study was requested by the Public Utilities Commission after intense community opposition to expansion on their existing site next to EP Foster Elementary School on Ventura’s Westside where leaks and health impacts have been an on-going problem. The Study evaluated some less-populated alternative locations but dismissed them because of the "uncertainty" and "time to permit and construct" at a new location, making the Study appear to be an empty exercise and simply a justification for SoCalGas’ existing plan, albeit with the possible addition of electric compressors along with the gas compressors.
The Study fell far short of traditional environmental review. There was no analysis of whether so much compression is needed given reduced demand from building electrification, and not a single alternative considered fewer compressors or less capacity. Nor did the Study evaluate the explosion and leak risks posed by the Ventura compressors and gas storage facility in Goleta, despite a 2015 disastrous release at a similar storage facility near Porter Ranch. The existing Ventura plant has itself had numerous gas releases including an instance when it was identified as a methane "super-emitter" in 2017 NASA flyover.
The Study also did not consider the climate impacts of fracking and piping all that methane gas from Texas when we could be powering our buildings more affordably with locally produced renewable energy. Meanwhile the forecasted cost for the project options ranged from $421 - $707 million, more than three times the original forecast of $133 million.
For that amount of money, we could retrofit every household in Santa Barbara County that wants to go all-electric and eliminate the need for all that gas in the first place.
If SoCalGas built a much smaller compressor with solar plus battery backup, then it could be all-electric and in an alternate location. We hope the Public Utilities Commission will investigate the option of a much smaller plant coupled with demand reduction. After all, the UN Secretary General was quoted in the LA Times recently: "Investing in new fossil fuels infrastructure is moral and economic madness."
We should make sure we have seriously considered alternatives before locking in new fossil-fuel infrastructure and saddling ratepayers with such high sunk and on-going costs.
On Ventura’s Olive Street, center stage of controversy at SoCal Gas’s compressor station that sits across the street from the Boys and Girls club and an elementary school. Residents and friends have rallied there more than once!
Related stories:
Westside ventura vigil begins (June 22, 2021)
Venturans insist on gas plant review (June 4, 2021)