{"id":348710,"date":"2025-12-14T19:01:14","date_gmt":"2025-12-14T19:01:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/348710\/"},"modified":"2025-12-14T19:01:14","modified_gmt":"2025-12-14T19:01:14","slug":"green-californias-big-oil-problem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/348710\/","title":{"rendered":"Green California\u2019s Big Oil Problem"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thousands of gallons of oil and toxic wastewater poured out of a pipe running through a Monterey County oil field on Friday, Dec. 5, in the latest of several recent spills around the state. The pipe released 168 gallons of oil and nearly 4,000 gallons of toxic wastewater from drilling operations managed by Aera Energy at the San Ardo Oil Field, which sits near olive groves, row crops and ranches at the southern end of the county\u2019s $5 billion<\/a> agricultural region.\u00a0<\/p>\n

For environmental justice communities and their allies, it\u2019s yet another sign that California is failing to live up to Gov. Gavin Newsom\u2019s claims of being a global climate leader.<\/p>\n

Over the past three months, California has averaged more than 70 oil spills per month, with petroleum polluting ports, harbors, streams and oil field soils, state data shows. In the past month alone, oil has poured out of malfunctioning pipes and tanks into ditches<\/a> and dirt roads<\/a> in Kern County, onto the shoulder of a highway<\/a> in Tulare County, into<\/a> a seasonally dry creek bed that feeds Los Angeles County\u2019s Santa Clara River<\/a> and into another creek<\/a> that ultimately flows into the Santa Clara, known as the only wild river<\/a> in Southern California.<\/p>\n

The day before a pipe failed at the San Ardo oil field last week\u2014the 95th spill in that oil field over the past 20 years, according to state data<\/a>\u2014a drilling rig off the coast of Santa Barbara County dumped crude oil<\/a> into the Pacific Ocean.<\/p>\n

The San Ardo incident is just the latest in a string of spills happening all around the state, said Hollin Kretzmann, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity\u2019s Climate Law Institute. \u201cCalifornia is supposed to be a leader in moving us towards a fossil fuel-free future, but these kinds of spills are a stark reminder that the state has a lot of work to do to live up to that,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

The San Ardo Oil Field is one of the most climate-polluting, carbon-intensive fields in the world<\/a>. Carbon intensity, a measure of total greenhouse gases emitted from exploration and drilling through transport to the refinery, increases with the amount of energy used to extract the oil.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The energy required to keep old oil fields in production can increase dramatically, along with climate pollution, even as petroleum yields drop, research shows<\/a>. California\u2019s oil production has plummeted since the mid-1980s<\/a>, as it has relied more and more on energy-intensive methods like steam injection to wrest thick, tarry crude oil from depleted, hard-to-reach underground reservoirs.<\/p>\n

San Ardo\u2019s carbon intensity is about twice as high as the average for crude oil destined for California refineries.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The failed pipe<\/a> in the aging oil field released toxic petroleum-tainted fluids about a mile away from the Salinas River, an irrigation<\/a> source for farmers in Monterey County\u2019s Salinas Valley, known as the \u201cSalad Bowl of the World\u201d for its year-round production of fruits, lettuce and other vegetables. The spill started a little after 7 a.m., when farmworkers around San Ardo are typically already out in the fields, planting carrots and wrapping up the cauliflower harvest.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Many oil fields operate near agricultural fields, compounding health risks for nearby communities. Around San Ardo, growers sprayed tens of thousands of pounds of pesticides classified as either possible, probable or likely human carcinogens and hundreds of pounds of chemicals linked to Parkinson\u2019s, state records show.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need more long-term solutions to stop dangerous oil spills from happening in our communities,\u201d said state Sen. Lena Gonzalez, a Long Beach Democrat who authored legislation<\/a> to restrict neighborhood drilling.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cOver the years, we\u2019ve made progress, but there\u2019s a lot more to do,\u201d Gonzalez said. \u201cToday\u2019s growing uncertainty under the current federal administration, on everything from climate to the economy, underscores just how urgent that work is.\u201d<\/p>\n

A spokesperson for California Resources Corp., which became the state\u2019s largest oil producer after acquiring Aera last year, said employees immediately responded to the incident and that the cleanup was swift. \u201cAll contaminated soil was removed within about 72 hours,\u201d the spokesperson said.<\/p>\n

\u201cA Non-Oil Future\u201d<\/p>\n

Last month, Gov. Gavin Newsom returned from COP30, the global climate talks in Brazil, after forging partnerships with several countries to reduce methane emissions and build climate resilience. The governor\u2019s actions at the summit, his administration said<\/a>, forged \u201cnew global partnerships and historic progress that cements California as a driving force for climate action worldwide.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yet the Newsom administration\u2019s efforts on the global stage have left California climate and environmental justice activists perplexed by his recent actions at home.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cLast fall, it was hugely unfortunate that the governor rammed through Senate Bill 237<\/a>, which fast-tracks oil and gas drilling in Kern County with no further environmental review,\u201d said Kretzmann.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Oil and gas companies and their trade groups spent more than $26 million between January and September of this year to influence state lawmakers on numerous issues and bills, including S.B. 237, state records show.\u00a0<\/p>\n

After Newsom signed the bill in September, Western States Petroleum Assn., a powerful oil and gas lobbying group, credited the governor\u2019s leadership for increasing crude production in Kern County \u201cunder the most stringent regulatory framework in the country\u201d to ensure access to affordable fuels.<\/p>\n

The law aimed to lower gas prices<\/a> by codifying an ordinance<\/a> to streamline oil and gas drilling permits adopted by Kern County, the state\u2019s oil epicenter. The county had recently revised the ordinance after years of legal challenges and a court ruling that it failed to comply with the California Environmental Quality Act, or CEQA, a foundational tool for communities to participate in the environmental review of new projects.<\/p>\n

The law greenlights potentially thousands of wells in the county that has probably suffered the most from oil and gas production, Kretzmann said. \u201cAt exactly the moment when we need to be doubling down on our transition away from oil production and towards electrification and a healthier and sustainable future,\u201d he said, \u201cthe governor is hell bent on doubling down on onshore production.\u201d<\/p>\n

A coalition of climate, environmental justice and public interest groups had urged the governor and legislative leaders in August to amend a draft version of S.B. 237, arguing in a letter<\/a> that the proposed actions marked \u201cthe arrival of the Trump Administration\u2019s \u2018drill, baby, drill\u2019 agenda in California\u201d without affecting oil supply or gas prices as intended.<\/p>\n

Gas prices are unrelated to what\u2019s going on with oil and gas refining and production in California, which is a function of economics and geology, said Deborah Sivas, professor of environmental law and a co-director of Stanford University\u2019s Environmental Law Clinic.\u00a0<\/p>\n

With increased adoption of EVs and progress on fuel efficiencies, \u201cthe long-term trajectory is less and less and less demand for gasoline,\u201d Sivas said. Plus, California imports more than 70 percent of its crude, because it\u2019s so expensive to get oil out of the ground in the state\u2019s depleted oil fields.\u00a0<\/p>\n

When refineries in California announced impending closures<\/a> this year, Sivas said, industry interests used the threat of $8 a gallon<\/a> gasoline to \u201cpanic the politicians\u201d into approving S.B. 237\u2019s permit exemptions.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Fast-tracking oil drilling won\u2019t affect pump prices, though, she said. In an analysis<\/a> of decades of data on permit approvals compared to new wells drilled, Sivas found that new permits failed to increase gas production and that drilling new wells had no effect on gas prices.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe absolutely should not be doing any new oil and gas infrastructure,\u201d Sivas said. \u201cWe should be thinking about a non-oil future, and that means no more drilling and starting to really repurpose those refinery sites.\u201d<\/p>\n

The governor\u2019s office did not respond to questions about why it promoted legislation that would allow more drilling, despite the lack of evidence that increased drilling will lower gas prices and while claiming to drive global action on climate.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Egregious Exemptions<\/p>\n

Emma Silber was disappointed to see California pass S.B. 237. \u201cIncreasing drilling is not the answer here, and increasing drilling in already overburdened communities is very much not the solution,\u201d said Silber, who signed the August letter as the climate justice program coordinator for Physicians for Social Responsibility LA.<\/p>\n

\u201cOnce again frontline BIPOC communities, whether in neighborhoods or folks working in agriculture, are being sacrificed for the profits of the industry and political expediency,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Recent research found that air pollution from fossil fuels causes tens of thousands of premature deaths per year across the country, Silber said. \u201cAnd if you\u2019re looking specifically in California, there are over 10,000 early deaths due to the fine particles from oil and gas emissions.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Texas and California bear the greatest burden for nearly all pollution-related health risks, including premature death, cancer and asthma, across the oil and gas life cycle, scientists reported in the study<\/a> Silber referenced, published in Science Advances. But the study just looked at adult health outcomes, she said, and didn\u2019t account for known reproductive harms, including increased risks of preterm births<\/a>, miscarriages, early infant death and childhood cancer<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re really concerned that as these drilling permits start to come out of Kern County, they\u2019ll just be rubber-stamped and move forward really quickly,\u201d Silber said. \u201cAnd the impacts to Kern County are potentially really harmful.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"AnAn oil well near the Kern County town of Lost Hills created large puddles as it spilled hydrocarbons onto the ground in September. Credit: Cesar Aguirre\/CCEJN<\/p>\n

Cesar Aguirre has been documenting the health harms of Kern County oil and gas production for several years. In late September, Aguirre, who directs Central California Environmental Justice Network\u2019s air and climate justice team, inspected a site around Lost Hills, a small, predominantly Latino farmworker community in western Kern County.<\/p>\n

He saw two steam-injection wells with \u201ca lot of fluid coming out\u201d creating large puddles. The next month, operators in Kern County reported about half a dozen petroleum spills to California regulators. \u201cThat only happens whenever folks are actually out there and looking at these wells that are allowed to fall into this condition because of the egregious and gigantic exemptions that exist within California law when it comes to regulating oil and gas wells,\u201d Aguirre said.<\/p>\n

California exempts \u201cheavy oil\u201d development infrastructure and small producers from critical emissions control and leak detection and repair requirements, Aguirre said. \u201cSixty-eight percent of the oil that\u2019s produced in California is heavy oil and 84 percent of the infrastructure associated with oil production is associated with heavy oil production.\u201d<\/p>\n

California likes to position itself as an environmental leader, Aguirre said, but where he lives in Kern County the state is a leader when it comes to leaks.<\/p>\n

\u201cI live in a California that has vast exemptions that allow leaks to happen legally in places like parks and places like parking lots next to apartment buildings and behind houses,\u201d he said. \u201cI live in a California that\u2019s been corrupted by oil and gas politics, and the consequence of that is that I live in the dirtiest air basin in the entire United States.\u201d<\/p>\n

The fact that California politicians are allowing oil companies to drill thousands and thousands of new wells, Aguirre said, left him wondering if they\u2019re aware of what\u2019s happening and don\u2019t care or if they need to be educated on what the reality of the on-the-ground conditions in California are really like.<\/p>\n

Kern County is a beautiful place with a lot worth protecting, Aguirre said, adding that while it leads the state in oil production, it\u2019s also a clean energy leader.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s in the best interest of California for Kern County to diversify its economy as much as possible and step into being the energy leader that the next generation needs,\u201d Aguirre said. \u201cAnd I think that\u2019s with renewable energy.\u201d<\/p>\n

County planners recently credited<\/a> the region\u2019s \u201cvast solar and wind potential\u201d as supporting an emerging energy hub.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would love for us to take that baton,\u201d Aguirre said, \u201cinstead of trying to prop up an industry that cannot be properly regulated without completely undoing and redoing the system.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tAbout This Story<\/p>\n

Perhaps you noticed: This story, like all the news we publish, is free to read. That\u2019s because Inside Climate News is a 501c3 nonprofit organization. We do not charge a subscription fee, lock our news behind a paywall, or clutter our website with ads. We make our news on climate and the environment freely available to you and anyone who wants it.<\/p>\n

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Two of us launched ICN in 2007. Six years later we earned a Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting, and now we run the oldest and largest dedicated climate newsroom in the nation. We tell the story in all its complexity. We hold polluters accountable. We expose environmental injustice. We debunk misinformation. We scrutinize solutions and inspire action.<\/p>\n

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Thank you,<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\"Liza<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t
\n\t\t\t\t\t\tLiza Gross\t\t\t\t\t<\/a><\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tReporter, California<\/p>\n

Liza Gross is a reporter for Inside Climate News based in Northern California. She is the author of The Science Writers\u2019 Investigative Reporting Handbook and a contributor to The Science Writers\u2019 Handbook, both funded by National Association of Science Writers\u2019 Peggy Girshman Idea Grants. She has long covered science, conservation, agriculture, public and environmental health and justice with a focus on the misuse of science for private gain. Prior to joining ICN, she worked as a part-time magazine editor for the open-access journal PLOS Biology, a reporter for the Food & Environment Reporting Network and produced freelance stories for numerous national outlets, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, Discover and Mother Jones. Her work has won awards from the Association of Health Care Journalists, American Society of Journalists and Authors, Society of Professional Journalists NorCal and Association of Food Journalists.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Thousands of gallons of oil and toxic wastewater poured out of a pipe running through a Monterey County…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":348711,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[192,79],"class_list":["post-348710","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-environment","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/348710","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=348710"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/348710\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/348711"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=348710"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=348710"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=348710"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}