County weighs oil answers

 

County officials, oil companies and the Board of Supervisors continue to grapple with solutions to the ongoing problem of oil spillage, with some progress achieved.

At their March 11 meeting, the supervisors received reports from county staff proposing various methods of combating contamination from oil and gas production in the area. They were also informed of progress made by oil producers dealing with spills at various sites since Jan. 15.

The spills have amounted to more than 12,000 gallons, most of it from Greka Oil & Gas Inc. facilities.

 

George Gross of the State Department of Fish and Game, site commander of the latest large spill, reported: “Zaca (Creek), the cleanup is complete, we’re in the restoration phase of the creek. We anticipate going back in there next week and finishing the creek portion.

“The roads are being restored on adjacent property owners’ property. The Bell Upper Pond facility, we anticipate being done sometime next week. Though it was a smaller volume than the December spill, there’s been some complication with cleanup.”

The county staff report contained five recommendations affecting responses to future oil and gas spills.

 

Further reports are scheduled during the next 60 days. Included in the staff reports were the following recommendations:

1. Develop a Multiple Response Ordinance: After a certain number of emergency responses and/or reportable releases at a petroleum operator’s facility, the operator to reimburse the County for costs associated with subsequent responses and/or releases.

2. Develop a High Risk Offender Ordinance: Research development of prospective financial assurance rules to ensure financial wherewithal to remove oil operations and reclaim sites upon cessation of operations.

3. Develop a centralized “Violation History” database.

4. Increase inspection and permitting fees for those facilities requiring extraordinary time for inspection. Revise fee ordinances further clarifying the flexibility for the Fire Department and Petroleum Unit to hire outside third-party contractors to perform permit inspections paid for by the operator.

5. Operational Efficiency

 

Recommendations: Direct staff to report on progress in dealing with Greka Energy every 60 days until significant progress is attained; and direct staff to work collaboratively with other regulatory agencies to address violations and public health and safety issues with on-shore oil facilities.

“I must say that I am very encouraged as to the progress that our staff has made,” said Supervisor Salud Carbajal (1st District). “If we don’t work aggressively to work together the public will not tolerate any more spills.” He singled out Greka for making “a positive effort” to clean up spills in recent months occurring on sites where it produces oil.

Citing public concern over spills by Greka, Carbajal said, “…cleanup is taking place in an expeditious process” because the “pubic has been clamoring because of the amounts of incidents and spills.”