Edhat Reader
By the Center for Biological Diversity
The Center for Biological Diversity and the Wishtoyo Chumash Foundation filed a formal notice today of their intent to sue the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management over the agency’s failure to require updated development plans for oil drilling at the troubled Santa Ynez Unit off the California coast.
The unit’s three platforms have been shut down since May 2015, when a corroded pipeline ruptured and released what is believed to be about 450,000 gallons of oil near Refugio State Beach. The oil spill killed hundreds of birds and marine mammals, including dolphins and sea lions.
Sable Offshore Corp., the pipeline’s new owner, wants to restart production at the Santa Ynez Unit relying primarily on outdated development plans written in the 1970s and 1980s. BOEM has not required Sable to revise or supplement the plans.
“I’m horrified that these zombie oil platforms may be allowed to restart after a decade of dormancy,” said Kristen Monsell, oceans legal director at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Offshore drilling is always dangerous but relying on woefully outdated plans raises the safety and environmental risks. If the agency tasked with managing ocean drilling isn’t even asking for a plan from this century before letting companies extract oil, our coastlines are really in trouble. It’s so frustrating that we have to sue the regulator to get them to do their job.”
Today’s notice says BOEM would be violating the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act if it allows drilling at the Santa Ynez Unit to proceed in federal waters without requiring updated plans. The agency is ignoring numerous harms from offshore oil and gas activity, including air pollution, risk of oil spills and contributing to climate change.
“The Santa Ynez Unit has continued to be a looming threat to Chumash cultural resources, marine ecosystems and the communities of Santa Barbara County,” said Mati Waiya, Executive Director of the Wishtoyo Chumash Foundation. “BOEM has betrayed the public’s trust by rubber stamping the restart of this air quality and public safety nightmare.”
The letter notifies BOEM that the Center will file suit unless the agency requires Sable to provide updated development plans before obtaining approval for restarting offshore drilling at the Santa Ynez Unit.
The Center for Biological Diversity is a national, nonprofit conservation organization with more than 1.7 million members and online activists dedicated to the protection of endangered species and wild places.
Founded in 1997, the Wishtoyo Chumash Foundation is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit grassroots organization that enhances the well being of communities by preserving and protecting Chumash Native American culture, and the natural resources all people depend upon throughout California and the traditional Chumash range in Ventura, Los Angeles, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties. To learn more about Wishtoyo visit us at www.wishtoyo.org.
We’ll be in a good place when *any* oil drilling plan is considered obsolete and banned.
I think your idea is great but probably, sadly, not in my lifetime.
Hypocrites. We ALL use products EVERY day.
We ALL want an alternative but wind and sun aren’t doing it.
MAYBE cold fusion one day.
Here, ANON (the one making things up). Take a look just how well renewables are “doing it.”
Renewable generation surpassed coal and nuclear in the U.S. electric power sector in 2022 – https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=55960
Electricity generated from renewables surpassed coal in the U.S. last year – https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/electricity-generated-from-renewables-surpassed-coal-in-the-u-s-last-year
Renewable energy passes 30% of world’s electricity supply – https://www.theguardian.com/environment/article/2024/may/08/renewable-energy-passes-30-of-worlds-electricity-supply
See now, this is it
This is the trick
Your comment is based in untruths
It’s literally mathematically impossible
The TOTAL account of energy generated by;
Renewables is 14%
Natural gas is at 40% and remains to be the main source of energy generation in our nation
Coal is second at around 20%
Don’t let your opinion be fueled by the lie (you like that little play on words there?)
God help us
See now
This is the trick
Under your nose
People are switching to carbon free
Intelligent people
Don’t live in your bubble
LAYT – I posted headlines and links to articles showing that renewable energy sources are being used more and more. Are you really disputing the fact that wind and solar are accounting for a larger share of our energy?
Read again.
But wind and sun are doing it. Pay attention.
Just not true.
Not true at all
I’m really beginning to think it’s too late though
So many people are tricked
It’s the idiocracy man
That first line applies well to the rest of your comment.
California uses massive amounts of oil. They can’t restart the platforms soon enough. Looking forward to their return to production.
So, you love smog and catastrophic weather?
Get your head out of the past.
Look in the mirror. You use oil-based products.
We don’t live in an all or nothing world. No one is claiming that we can completely replace petrochemical products any time soon. However, we can absolutely reduce their use with alternative materials and forms of energy.
Why are you excited about increasing production in the channel? Let me guess-you hold oil stocks. It can’t possibly be about any real impact on your daily life other than investment.
And your point is?
Which specific rigs are we talking about here? There’s no mention in this article. Obviously an anti oil drilling post but let’s see some facts and details. Thanks.
The Santa Ynez Unit is Hondo, Heritage & Harmony
Ok thank you. The photo provided shows different rigs – those that we typically call A, B, C, and D – straight off SB. Thanks for clarifying.
I don’t know who you’re referring to when you say we
Do you have a mouse in your pocket ?
Or are you referring to the royal We
There’s no ABC and d
Do some research
To understand why we are still using dirty 19th century energy, and giving billion dollar subsidies to monopolies with record profits, I recommend reading the book, “Suppressed Inventions” by Jonathan Eisen.
Life would be catastrophic should we suddenly stopped all oil. We need to taper.
The first part of your sentence is good, but we don’t need any conspiracy nonsense or perpetual motion machines. Renewable non-carbon sources will do.
Everything we’ve done for climate change has failed – look at the hurricaine.
Do you don a red ball nose before posting this nonsense, just to get in the zone?
RUBY – wow. That’s 100% factually incorrect. Not only have we cleaned up our planet a great deal, despite the intense resistance from your kind, we are steadily moving to slow the massive damage caused by fossil fuels.
And no. The existence of a hurricane is in no way, in any sense of anything resembling reason or logic, “proof” that we have “failed” to fight climate change.
Given your persistent and casual racism and homophobia, I’m pretty sure you are stuck in an ancient mindset; one that lends to being easily duped by misinformation and ignorant rantings of certain politicians.
The hurricanes, tornadoes, intense heat, bitter cold, record rains, flooding landslides all intensifying. And climate change is better? Glacial melting, sea level rise. – what else can go wrong? Massive loss of life and you say it’s better? What a joke!
RUBY – yes, those are all symptoms of human caused climate change. I never said climate change is “better,” just pointing out that we have not yet “failed” at fixing some of the damage done by your generation.
Our planet was harmed, we’re now implementing many ways to help heal it. But, people like you and the far right are doing everything they can to stop this progress..
Ask yourself why you don’t want to help repair our planet?
Conspiracy and perpetual motion? are you losing it anon?
Red nose it is.
There are no monopolies in the oil industry. Oil production companies throughout the world compete in an open market when selling their products. Adjusted for inflation, gas prices today are about the same as they were in 1977. Don’t you think a true monopoly would have raised prices over the past 40 years? (The real increase in gas prices in California is due to government requirements and new taxes.)
Oil companies are not subsidized; a subsidy refers to direct monetary payouts. What you’re calling a subsidy is actually the government allowing oil companies to deduct the actual cost of doing business from their income—just as I do as a self-employed person, which reduces their tax obligations. That’s not a subsidy.
Much of the increase in profits (in dollars) can be attributed to inflation. If the dollar is worth 20% less and oil sales remain constant, prices and profits will naturally rise by over 20%, but no new wealth has been created.
In 2020, Exxon lost $22 billion, and in 2023, they made $36 billion. Profit margins for Apple, JPMorgan, and Facebook (Meta) are each around 25%, Microsoft’s is about 30%, and Visa’s is nearly 50%. In comparison, Exxon’s profit margin is currently around 10%.
Odd behavior more a monopoly.
I saw “Suppressed Inventions” on The X-Files.
Ever heard of OPEC?
Gas prices should be about 5 times what they currently are to reflect all the subsidies the oil companies get, all the damage they do to the environment, and all the toxic sites they’ve abandoned.