Kudos to the Environmental Defense Center for successfully opposing Sable Offshore’s attempt to block the effects of its proposed reopening of the former Plains All-American Pipeline from public view.
The document Sable wanted to keep from the public, an oil spill contingency plan, contains information about the structural condition of the pipeline; Sable’s plan to respond to an emergency, including another spill; and the company’s analysis of a worst-case spill scenario.
In rejecting Sable’s attempt at secrecy, Sacramento County Superior Court Judge Stephen Acquisto correctly ruled, “Sable made no credible argument to justify its claims that the pipeline’s condition and the company’s plan for a worst-case oil spill should be concealed from the public.”
This attempt at secrecy is nothing new for the oil industry.
It knew about the relationship between burning fossil fuels and climate change since the 1950s.
Still, it kept it secret until science proved unequivocally what the industry already knew, that fossil fuel products were causing global warming with dramatic environmental effects.
Beginning in 1969 with the Santa Barbara oil spill, Santa Barbara County learned a lot about the devastating effects of such spills: oil-soaked beaches and thousands of dead birds, fish, seals and dolphins.
The Plains All-American Pipeline, which ruptured in 2015 near Refugio State Beach, spilled an estimated 123,228 gallons of crude oil into the Pacific Ocean, again polluted 150 miles of our coast, and killed hundreds of birds, fish, seals and dolphins.
Oil spills are an inevitable consequence of humans’ unquenchable search for fossil fuels. We saw this with the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska and the 2021 offshore pipeline rupture off Huntington Beach.
As long as we have oil production, we will continue to have oil spills and global warming.
If we are ever to get a handle on climate change, we must understand that it is a “game changer,” changing everything we thought we knew about our dependence on fossil fuels.
Oil energy has the highest carbon footprint of all energy types. Greenhouse gas emissions from oil and gas operations include carbon dioxide and methane emissions.
Santa Barbara County has been an oil-producing municipality since the 19th century, with the Santa Barbara Channel having its first offshore well in Summerland in 1896.
Based on April 2023 production levels, the county has 6,800 wells on file (679 of them producing) and produced 207,700 barrels of oil.
Adding in San Luis Obispo and Ventura counties, tri-county oil production was 644,500 barrels in April.
The truth is that Santa Barbara County does not need either more oil development or oil pollution in our environment.
This includes the reopening of the former Plains All-American Pipeline. According to a draft environmental impact report from Santa Barbara County, restarting the pipeline will likely result in a pipeline oil spill every year.
The county, recognizing the environmental dangers of climate change, is developing a plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 50% by 2030. This should include not only shutting down the pipeline but all oil development in Santa Barbara County.