Keeping new oil rigs off of coast won’t be easy, officials say

From left: Torrance City Councilmember Kurt Weideman; Jennifer Lucchesi, executive officer for the State Lands Commission; Hermosa Beach Mayor Jeff Duclos; Sarah Freidman, senior campaign representative for the Sierra Club; Alison Dettmer, deputy director of the Energy, Ocean Resources and Federal Consistency Division of the California Coastal Commission; Hermosa resident Michael Collins, a co-founder of the Keep Hermosa Hermosa campaign; Sarah Sikich, vice president of Heal the Bay; Stacey Armato, Hermosa’s mayor pro tem; Manhattan Beach Mayor Amy Howorth; and Assemblymember Al Muratsuchi (D-Torrance), gathered at the Hermosa Beach Community Center last Friday to discuss proposed regulations from the Trump Administration that could open California’s coast to oil drilling for the first time in generations. Photo

 

 

Three years ago, keeping oil out of Hermosa Beach required a monumental effort from the community. A similar effort may be needed, all across California, to make sure new drilling stays out.

That was the conclusion of local elected officials who joined representatives from state land use agencies and environmental groups at the Hermosa Beach Community Theater last week. A panel organized by Assemblymember Al Muratsuchi (D-Torrance) discussed the recently proposed changes to federal oil drilling regulations. Rules recently proposed by the Trump Administration could potentially transform the California coast by permitting new offshore oil drilling here for the first time in generations, panelists said.

“We consider what’s going on right now one of the most serious threats to the coast in the last 30 years,” said Alison Dettmer, deputy director of the Energy, Ocean Resources and Federal Consistency Division of the California Coastal Commission.

On Jan. 4, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management (BOEM) proposed a new Outer Continental Shelf National Oil and Gas Leasing Program for 2019 through 2024. Every five years, the federal agency is required to circulate new regulations governing oil drilling in federal waters. The Trump Administration’s recently proposed regulations represent a drastic departure from those put in place during the Obama presidency. The Obama regulations kept almost all of the nation’s coastline, save a portion of the Gulf of Mexico, off-limits to new drilling. Trump’s 2019-2024 proposed regulations would open to drilling some 98 percent of U.S. coastlines, including all of California’s.

The state’s Coastal Commission is best known for ensuring developments such as homes and hotels in coastal cities are consistent with the State Coastal Act. But Dettmer said that the land-use agency, unlike any other state body, also has a role in federal waters. The regulations are currently in a draft stage, but if the final version were to include California, Dettmer said, that would trigger the need for an in-depth environmental review of the proposal, akin to what occurs under the California Environmental Quality Act.

The Coastal Commission could object and sue, but even if a court were to side with the state, Dettmer said, federal law gives the President the power to override the decision.

State and local officials have responded to the uncertainty with new laws of their own. Muratsuchi recently co-authored AB 1775, which, along with its counterpart in the Senate, SB 834, would prevent California’s State Lands Commission from approving new infrastructure needed for oil drilling, such as pipelines. South Bay cities, including Hermosa, have passed resolutions and written letters supporting the measures.

The Lands Commission is the state’s landlord for the “tidelands,” the area stretching out to three miles seaward of the high-tide line, where federal waters begin in California. Jennifer Lucchesi, the commission’s executive officer, said the agency grew out of the state’s burgeoning oil and gas extraction industry in the 1930s. But a lease for new drilling in state waters hasn’t been issued since 1969. And in recent years the commission has entered a “transitionary period” in which it is becoming more focused on environmental stewardship.

“With the State Lands Commission and the Coastal Commission, you have a very significant, strong barrier…The federal government has a lot of tools in its chest, but we also have some tools in our chest,” Lucchesi said.

Nonetheless, even if Muratsuchi’s bill were to pass, it is not a guaranteed way of stopping new drilling. Dettmer pointed out that, if the new leasing regulations were enacted, oil companies could rely on existing pipeline infrastructure to get the crude to shore, and could build offshore storage and treatment units by hiring an oil reclamation service, something ExxonMobil did in the 1980s.

Also speaking at the meeting were Sarah Sikich, a vice president at Heal the Bay, Sarah Friedman, a senior campaign representative with the Sierra Club, Hermosa Councilmember Stacey Armato and resident Mike Collins. Armato and Collins co-founded the Keep Hermosa Hermosa campaign that organized the landslide defeat of Measure O in 2015. They urged those opposed to offshore drilling to get involved, starting with filing a comment on the BOEM’s website. Among the things regulators are charged with considering is the value of a pristine coast to the economy, officials said. The comments will help regulators determine whether any or all of California’s coast will be included in the new lease program. The deadline for filing comments is March 9.

“The coast is never saved. It is always being saved,” said Mayor Jeff Duclos, quoting Peter Douglass, the late founder of the California Coastal Commission.

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