By Katie Davis
Don’t Enable Sable
The pressure was on Gov. Gavin Newsom as Central Coast environmental groups and community activists including Jane Fonda and Julia Louis-Dreyfus held a press conference on March 13 to demand Newsom hold state agencies accountable -- to step up to protect our coast and communities from another disastrous oil spill. Check out what they and others have said: https://tinyurl.com/JaneJuliaFilm
House Rep. Salud Carbajal and Senator Adam Schiff both penned a letter advocating that Newsom raise concerns about the restart of the Sable pipeline. Read about it here:
https://tinyurl.com/RepsOilLetter
May 19 will mark the 10-year anniversary of 2015 Refugio oil spill, and it has been a busy month for the coalition opposing the restart of the corroded pipeline that burst and caused that spill. A speculative startup, Sable Offshore, purchased Exxon’s three shuttered offshore oil platforms, its oil processing plants, and the corroded pipeline in a 2024 sale financed by Exxon itself.
By loaning the money to a startup to buy its assets on the Gaviota coast, Exxon would avoid liability for a risky restart.
This didn’t sit well with Santa Barbara County Supervisors, Laura Capps and Roy Lee, who voted on Feb. 25 against transferring the permits (and liability) for the pipeline and Los Flores Canyon oil facility from Exxon to Sable. Supervisor Joan Hartmann recused herself because the pipeline runs by her property.
And North County Supervisors Steven Lavagnino and Bob Nelson sided with the oil companies. The resulting 2:2 tie meant “no action” and permits were not transferred. That doesn’t necessarily stop Sable, which could operate under Exxon’s permits.
Sable also doesn’t necessarily follow laws that it doesn’t like, which became apparent at an unprecedented March 13 meeting at La Cumbre Junior High School held by Assembly member Gregg Hart and State Senator Monique Limón to hear from the heads of all eight state agencies that have a role in regulating Sable’s oil operation.
The CA Coastal Commission, Fish and Wildlife and the Regional Water Quality Control Board had issued notices of violation and stop work orders that Sable had ignored. Commission Deputy Director Cassidy Teufel said that Sable has committed numerous Coastal Act violations, and that the work often involved disrupting and destroying sensitive habitats.
“This is the first time in the agency’s history that we’ve had a party blatantly ignore a cease-and-desist order like this and refuse to submit a permit application,” Teufel said.
State Fire Marshal Chris Berlant promised that the agency would not sign off on a restart of the pipeline until all the other agencies at the table had resolved their issues with Sable.
Green Films
Marjorie Luke Theater is hosting a Green Film Festival in 2025 with opportunities to learn more about offshore oil. On Sunday, April 13 at 4pm they are showing the movie, “BROKE: The Santa Barbara Oil Pipeline Spill of 2015” and on Sunday, June 22 at 4pm they are showing a powerful documentary about the gulf oil spill and health impacts called “The Cost of Silence."
https://tinyurl.com/BrokeDocumentary
https://tinyurl.com/CostOfShhhh
May 13 Oil Vote
Last August SB Supervisors asked staff to come back in six months with ways to include oil and gas facilities in the Climate Action Plan.
After some delay, we now have a date of May 13 when county staff will be offering options including an oil phase-out. The oil projects that have been proposed in this County over the past decade have been cyclic steam or steam flooding proposals, which are the most energy-intensive forms of oil production. The carbon intensity (which measures the full carbon cost including production, transportation and refining) is higher than the average oil imported from around the globe.
The carbon intensity of California-sourced oil is growing at three times the rate of oils produced outside of California. The unconventional oil left in our County is particularly bad for the climate and the kind that should be phased out first. Diesel trucks and gas-burning steam generators not only produce greenhouse gases, but they also emit health-damaging air pollution that causes cancer, asthma, heart disease, and other conditions.
For instance, according to the California Air Resources Board, oil production was the largest facility source of PM2.5, Benzene, Formaldehyde, VOCs, Nitrogen Oxide and Sulfur Oxide in the county in recent years. Phasing out oil will save lives in Santa Barbara County.
Visit the Santa Barbara Sierra Club booth at Earth Day in Alameda Park on April 26-27 to learn more and sign a postcard.