After spending more than $25 million on canvassing and political advertising, California’s oil and gas industry has announced it will withdraw a hotly contested referendum from the November ballot that seeks to remove restrictions on drilling near homes and schools.
California Independent Petroleum Assn. announced this week that its members will resist an expensive push to repeal Senate Bill 1137, a 2022 state law that would prevent new oil and gas wells from being drilled within 3,200 meters of homes, schools, parks and hospitals. Not long after the speech, the oil and gas companies organized an effort to collect enough signatures to put the state law up for a vote in the November 5 general election.
In recent months, however, the Petroleum Assn. admitting the referendum has not achieved a sufficient level of public support, according to polls. It has also found a groundswell of resistance from a well-funded countercampaign featuring the appearance of Gov. Gavin Newsom, former Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and Hollywood icon Jane Fonda.
And, in perhaps one last-ditch effort to forge a compromise, Assemblyman Isaac Bryan (D-Los Angeles) said he recently entered into negotiations with fossil fuel interests, saying he would limit the financial penalties in a separate bill if he pulls out. voting initiative.
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The oil industry’s decision to withdraw the proposition marks an unexpected end to one of the country’s most expensive political contests. In a country filled with more than 100,000 untapped oil and gas wells, environmental advocates say defending setback laws is essential to stopping fossil fuels from warming the planet and protecting residents who live near toxic fumes released by drilling sites.
Nearly a third of those wells are within 3,200 feet of homes, schools and other sensitive areas, exposing nearly 3 million people to cancer-causing pollution. In addition to restricting new drilling, the law would prohibit maintenance and redrilling, keeping older wells closed.
“This is a huge and historic win,” said Kassie Siegel, senior adviser to the Center for Biological Diversity. “Victory like this is not every day. The oil industry just retreated in total defeat.
Siegel portrayed the development as a last gasp for oil and gas production.
“It’s an industry that’s going away,” he said. “What the state needs to do is monitor this ongoing decline in a way that minimizes the collateral damage that this dying industry does when it goes out the door.”
But the state Petroleum Assn. not admitting defeat – vowing to fight California’s good law and similar laws in court.
“Californians do not want to further increase our dependence on expensive foreign crude while California workers can create local energy under the strictest regulations in the world,” said Jonathan Gregory, chairman of the California Independent Petroleum Assn. He added: “We are pivoting from a referendum to a legal strategy because it violates the US Constitution for the government to take private property illegally, especially operations that are authorized by the government and all impacts are reduced.”
Although the oil industry called the 3,200-foot setback “arbitrary,” the distance was established by a 15-member panel of health experts convened by the Newsom administration. The panel concluded there is a strong link to higher rates of asthma, heart disease and adverse birth outcomes for people living within a radius of oil and gas development.
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The legislation is expected to have tremendous health benefits in Southern California, where some of the largest oil fields border densely populated communities. Creating those protections is especially important to Bryan, whose district includes the Inglewood oil field — the nation’s largest urban oil field that lies beneath Baldwin Hills, Culver City, Inglewood and Ladera Heights.
“I see certain oil fields being completely depleted in the next decade and a half,” Bryan said. “And I think the health impact for the surrounding communities will be immeasurable – longer life expectancy, lower heart rates, lower childhood asthma rates and the opportunity to live and thrive without that well being poisoned next door.” “
To that end, Bryan said he is using Assembly Bill 2716 in negotiations with oil and gas interests. The co-authored bill would impose a $10,000 fine for operating an under-producing well within 3,200 feet of a sensitive site. In the discussion, Bryan said that if the ballot measure is withdrawn, he will amend AB 2716 so that the daily penalty applies only to the Inglewood oil field.
