By Curt Barry, INSIDE EPA
California Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) has signed into law a bill requiring the State Fire Marshall (SFM) to adopt regulations for the transportation of carbon dioxide in pipelines, including safety standards that must be as protective as proposed requirements from the federal Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration (PHMSA).
But environmental justice (EJ) and other groups are criticizing the move because they want a partial moratorium on CO2 pipelines in the state to remain in place at least until PHMSA finalizes its rules.
“Carbon management is a critical pillar of California’s world-leading efforts to cut climate pollution. I’m signing this legislation to put our state on the leading edge of an emerging 21st Century industry that will not only help us address the climate crisis but create good paying, skilled jobs,” Newsom said in an Oct. 10 press release announcing his signing of the bill, SB 614.
The governor’s office says the law “authorizes the safe development of dedicated pipelines to move carbon dioxide captured from emitters or removed from the atmosphere to underground geological formations for permanent storage.”
The law “is a vital next step to further foster the nascent carbon capture, removal, and sequestration market here in California. This action comes as the Trump administration reverses course on federal policies incentivizing the development of these projects and technologies,” it adds.
Sen. Henry Stern (D-Los Angeles), author of the bill, said it “will ensure that California adopts best-in-class regulations for carbon dioxide pipeline safety through a public process that elevates community input while encouraging major investment in the clean energy transition of our most fossil fuel intensive industries.”
And Assemblywoman Cottie Petrie-Norris (D-Irvine), a co-author of SB 614, said carbon capture “is an important part of the climate puzzle — we need [carbon capture, utilization and storage (CCUS)] technologies to deliver on our climate goals and build California’s clean energy future.” The new law will also “accelerate California’s climate progress, spur billions of dollars in climate investments, and create thousands of high road jobs across the state,” she added.
While PHMSA issued its proposed CO2 pipeline standards in January — just days before President Trump took office — observers are not expecting the agency to advance the proposal during the Trump administration.
Strong Opposition
But dozens of EJ, environmental and community groups strongly opposed SB 614. While they “fully support California regulating above and beyond what PHSMA sets as the federal floor,” ending California’s “existing partial moratorium before PHSMA’s regulations are complete risks preemption and prevents the state and its residents from benefitting from the nationwide attention and expert input that the federal rulemaking will generate,” according to a Senate floor analysis of the measure.
“Ending the moratorium prematurely will also accelerate the poor investment and false climate solution that is [carbon sequestration]. In short, there is no benefit to California jumping out early and changing the precautionary measure that is already in place,” the opponents add.
The moratorium on building CO2 pipelines in California is contained in a 2022 law, SB 905, which primarily directs state agencies to create a CCUS regulatory framework. Pipelines “shall only be utilized to transport CO2 to or from a CO2 project once [PHMSA] has concluded its pending rulemaking regarding minimum federal safety standards for transportation of CO2 by pipeline and the CO2 project operator demonstrates that the pipeline meets those standards,” according to an Assembly analysis of SB 905.
However, the provision “does not apply to carbon captured at a permitted facility and transported within that facility or property,” it adds. A legislative source noted last year that there are already some CO2 pipelines being used in California, primarily by petroleum industry facilities on contiguous parcels that companies own.
Last month, Consumer Watchdog urged Newsom to veto SB 614, arguing it “contains no setback between such pipelines and communities with sensitive receptors from hospitals to schools and daycares,” according to a Sept. 23 press release. “It also leaves up to the Fire Marshal the use of an odorant that, added to the compressed carbon to produce the smell of rotten eggs, would warn the public there is something wrong should a pipeline leak or burst.”
