Concerns include fiscal liabilities to the county and state, and that there are currently only one supervisor and one employee to conduct inspections
A
Santa Barbara County Grand Jury report has found limited county government
oversight of idle oil wells, with a lack of adequate staffing in the Petroleum
Unit of the county’s Planning and Development Department and the failure to
enforce Santa Barbara County Code provisions regarding removal of drilling
equipment following oil well abandonment.
According
to the California Geologic Energy Management Division’s most recent idle oil
well inventory cited in the Grand Jury report, there are 6,618 oil wells in
Santa Barbara County, of which 5,590 are idle and have not been used in at
least two years.
About
1,374 of those idle oil wells throughout the county have been abandoned but
remain uncapped, posing a greater risk of seepage.
“Such
idle oil wells pose special health and environmental hazards because their
seepage can go undetected without monitoring by trained professionals,” the
report states. “Should there be seepage, causing toxic emissions or pollution
from an idle well, the cleanup, remediation and lost income costs could fall on
Santa Barbara County. … Seepage from active and idle wells can contaminate
groundwater, and methane gas emitted from wells can pollute the air, while
harming animal and plant biodiversity.”
A
recent example of that kind of oil seepage was the natural seepage in Toro
Canyon Creek in August. It was the result of an uncapped 19th-century oil well,
which had been retrofitted to prevent seepage but that was damaged in the
Thomas Fire and heavy rain events.
In
2019, 80 to 125 gallons of crude oil spilled at Haskell’s Beach in Goleta, when
crews were working to abandon wells at the beach’s piers.
The
Grand Jury report also stated that the Petroleum Unit within the county
Planning and Development Department has one supervisor and two employees who
conduct inspections of oil wells. One of the employees recently has been on
leave, leaving only one to complete inspections of all of Santa Barbara
County’s oil wells.
“It
is a challenge to inspect all oil wells in the field, and the Jury believes
that the number of staff is currently insufficient to complete inspections of
all idle wells,” the report stated.
Noozhawk
By Serena Guentz
December 31, 2021
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