By John Cox, BAKERSFIELD.COM
Environmental groups spoke up in opposition Wednesday to Kern County’s approval this year of hundreds of new oil well drilling permits, targeting in particular those that involve the use of “enhanced oil recovery” techniques.
Los Angeles-based Consumer Watchdog and Pennsylvania’s FracTracker Alliance sent out a news release reporting that 81% of the 190 drilling permits the county issued during the first quarter were for so-called “EOR” wells, which can include steam- and waterflooding production methods. The nonprofits called the techniques resource-intensive and potentially polluting.
Coming on the heels of a year during which no EOR wells were approved in California, the release essentially criticizes Gov. Gavin Newsom for signing legislation in September that gave Kern County environmental clearance to approve local oil-field work following a decade-long legal battle.
“California just handed Kern County to the oil industry on a platter,” FracTracker’s western program director, Kyle Ferrar, said in the release.
Consumer Watchdog advocate Liza Tucker added, “Gov. Newsom’s reversal on drilling, even as he claims national climate leadership, is blatantly hypocritical.”
County government and representatives of the state’s oil industry dismissed the groups’ condemnation as misdirected, saying EOR is a highly regulated, routine alternative to relying entirely on imported oil that is subject to disruption.
Director Craig Murphy of the county’s Planning and Natural Resources Department said by email a tremendous amount of environmental work went into the county’s permitting rules. He noted they contain more than 80 measures intended to soften the industry’s local impacts, including multimillion-dollar payments to programs designed to improve the quality of the region’s air and drinking water.
He noted few wells were approved by the state until Kern County was allowed to issue permits in early January.
“Of course the numbers of new wells would go up now that we are actively able to issue permits using state-approved recovery methods,” Murphy wrote.
The Newsom administration proposed Senate Bill 237 authorizing Kern to issue oil permits after refinery closures raised the prospect of steep gasoline price increases. The closures were partly attributed to a drop in oil production blamed on a scarcity of drilling permits under Newsom.
One reason for the environmental groups’ concern, their release said, is that drilling injection wells next to old wells in “aging, overdeveloped fields” risks spills that can go on for years, potentially leading to dangerous and damaging eruptions of oil, rock and mud.
It went on to contend that EOR uses large quantities of freshwater and has an “extremely high” carbon footprint that it said may negate climate-based arguments in favor of local production.
Wednesday’s report noted Chevron U.S.A. Inc. received more drilling permits than any other producer between Jan. 1 and May 9 with 133 — 86% of them for EOR. Bakersfield’s Aera Energy LLC was next with 88 permits (35% for EOR), followed by Sentinel Peak Resources California LLC’s 41 (98% EOR) and then California Resources Corp.’s 24 (54%).
A spokesman for the Western States Petroleum Association said by email it was encouraging to see such strong appetite for new wells, which he linked to economic and job gains.
“It’s a shame these activists are trying to take all those benefits away and undermine the industry that powers Kern County’s economy,” spokesman Jim Stanley wrote.
The head of another oil trade group, the California Independent Petroleum Association, said EOR is not only safe but less carbon-intense than methods deployed by overseas producers that are California’s primary alternative to in-state production.
A local Chevron spokeswoman said EOR is a well-established approach with a long history in the San Joaquin Valley. She pointed to layered regulatory approvals that EOR requires, along with continuous monitoring of operations.
A CRC spokeswoman characterized the jump in permits as a return to historical norms.
“Any increase in activity would naturally include more enhanced oil recovery, which involves long-established production techniques safely utilized in California’s mature oil fields for decades,” spokeswoman Hailey Bonus said by email.
