Sable Offshore Energy Clears Major Hurdle to Restart Damaged Pipeline in Santa Barbara County

Governor Newsom’s Office Intervenes to Stop Local Public Meeting with State Fire Marshal over Pipeline Safety

State Senator Monique Limón (center) and State Assemblymember Gregg Hart (center left) have both expressed keen disappointment in the decision of the state Fire Marshal and governor's office to grant a “waiver” to Sable that qualifies as a key procedural victory in its plans to restart the oil pipeline that caused 2015's Refugio Oil Spill. | Credit: Courtesy Office of Monique Limón and Paul Wellman File Photo

California State Fire Marshal Daniel Berlant approved a key pipeline-corrosion-control plan submitted by the Sable Offshore oil company on December 17 that’s absolutely pivotal in the company’s long-range efforts to reactivate not just the pipeline — which ruptured and spilled about 450,000 gallons of crude in 2015 — but for restarting production at what used to be ExxonMobil’s massive oil and gas operations in Las Flores Canyon. Exxon, like all oil operators off the Gaviota Coast, has been shut down the past nine years because of that pipeline rupture.

For Sable — which took over Exxon’s processing plant, pipeline, and three offshore oil platforms two years ago — the Fire Marshal’s decision on December 17 to issue a “waiver” for the plant’s “cathodic protection” corrosion control system qualifies as a key procedural victory in its efforts to get the former Exxon plant restarted again.

State Assemblymember Gregg Hart and State Senator Monique Limón have both expressed keen disappointment in how the decision was made, coming 13 days after the California Fire Marshal had given them both strict assurances no such decision would be released until he’d first held a public meeting in Santa Barbara to hear concerns from community members. That meeting did not happen and has been tentatively postponed until sometime after January 1.

Waivers were required from Sable for the pipeline’s cathodic protection system because that system is designed to protect pipelines that are both heated and insulated, as Sable’s pipeline is, from corrosion. That system — which for many oil pipelines is regarded as fundamental essential safety equipment — utterly failed to protect the pipeline from the ravaging effects of corrosion that caused the 2015 rupture, spill, cleanup, and subsequent criminal conviction of Plains All American Pipeline, the pipeline’s owner at the time of the spill.

In fact, the cathodic protection system was mandated by the conditions of approval for the pipeline when it was first approved and installed in the late 1980s by what was then the Celeron Pipeline Company. That pipeline was subsequently purchased by the Plains All American Pipeline Company, then by Exxon, and, now, most recently by Sable.

According to a statement issued by the Fire Marshal’s office, the waiver does not “abandon” the requirement for cathodic protection but acknowledges that the system in place is not adequate to prevent leaks and spills and that Sable must use “alternate measures to meet or exceed” specified state and federal safety requirements. According to the statement, “There are 63 conditions listed in the State Waiver that ensure Sable will exceed minimum protections. These conditions include additional reporting requirements for leak detection and more stringent integrity testing.”

Sable issued a statement expressing “appreciation” that the Fire Marshal approved the waiver and forwarded it to the federal agency in charge of pipeline safety for concurrence. Company spokesperson Alice Walton stated that Sable’s proposal includes “state-of-the-art internal and external inspection” programs that will be deployed 10 times more frequently than currently required to address “potential anomalies.” “Anomalies” is an industry term to refer to corrosion hot spots. After the 2015 spill, federal pipeline regulators determined there were at least 92 such anomalies.

Walton added that Sable’s waiver application pledged to repair such anomalies at a rate 20 percent higher than required by existing regulations. To put the amount of work anticipated in perspective, Walton stated, “Anomaly repairs average 1.5 excavations per mile along the 124-mile pipeline.”

Attorneys with the Environmental Defense Center (EDC) and the Center for Biological Diversity — both leading the charge to stop Sable from restarting the former Exxon production facility — issued press releases blasting the Fire Marshal’s action. Both press releases have the same headline: “California Allows Dangerous Santa Barbara Oil Project to Move Forward.” Both question the fundamental safety of a pipeline that was allowed to get so badly corroded as the one Sable hopes to restart and have challenged the notion that such a damaged pipeline can be repaired to be “as new” as Sable has promised.

Likewise, the EDC has objected that the public has not been allowed to review the documents in which the details of the proposed waiver are outlined. They contended that the technology for in-line oil-pipeline integrity, on which Sable and the Fire Marshal are relying, is notably unreliable.

According to analysis of the 2015 spill by the federal pipeline agency, the in-line detection system then checking the pipeline missed the boat. According to inspection reports, the pipeline where the rupture occurred was 47 percent corroded. But when the pipeline was excavated and the level of actual corrosion measured, they discovered the true level of pipeline corrosion was 86 percent.

From their respective perches in Sacramento, State Assemblymember Hart and State Senator Limón have been working hard to bird-dog the project with the Fire Marshal and other state agencies with oversight jurisdiction. Hart acknowledged that he himself had not seen the waiver application or the waiver approval. “I probably wouldn’t understand it if I did,” he added. “These are highly technical documents.”

Limón was equally blunt: “Let’s get this straight. I am not a pipeline inspector, right.”

“I never experienced anything like this, a direct promise that was not kept,” said State Assemblymember Gregg Hart of the “about-face” on the point-blank assurances he and State Senator Monique Limón received from state officials that no decision would be made about Sable and its waiver request until after a public meeting was held in Santa Barbara first. | Credit: Courtesy Office of Gregg Hart

While Sable executives have undeniable cause to sigh vast cumulonimbus clouds of relief, it remains premature for them to start popping champagne corks, suggested Limón. “Yes, this is a setback, and yes, it’s disappointing. But it is hardly the last word on the proposal, and it’s hardly the final decision,” she stated. The Fire Marshal, she noted, still has two key decisions to make on pipeline and plant safety. Five other state agencies, she stressed, must sign off on aspects of Sable’s proposal, as well.

When Hart and Limón spoke with the Fire Marshal and members of Governor Gavin Newsom’s staff about this on December 4, the governor’s staff committed to generating a flow chart clarifying just what jurisdictional bite out of Sable’s proverbial apple each of these agencies had. What was their purview? What findings did they have to make to greenlight Sable? What evidence was required to make those findings? And what were their respective deadlines?

According to an interview with Hart on December 19, that flow chart has yet to be generated.

To the extent anyone currently has this information, it is the government affairs officers and land-use consultants working for Sable.

Hart and Limón have found themselves put in the unusual and uncomfortable position of having to herd cats for these six state agencies on behalf of the Santa Barbara community at large, because earlier this summer, the County of Santa Barbara settled the lawsuit Sable filed against the Board of Supervisors by agreeing that it had no jurisdiction over any work the company did on the pipeline. Once the county settled with Sable, it ceased to offer the traditional community portal for public hearings that the county’s Planning Commission and the Board of Supervisors always has in the county’s historic and often epic battles over oil development.

During Hart and Limón’s December 4 meeting with the Fire Marshal and representatives of the governor’s staff, they say they were given point-blank assurances by the Fire Marshal that no decision would be made about Sable and its waiver request until after a public meeting was held in Santa Barbara first. It was not clear at that point whether the meeting would involve just the Fire Marshal or representatives from the other state agencies with jurisdiction. What was clear, however, was that this gathering would not have the legal weight of a public hearing — where testimony is entered into the public record and has the quasi-legal weight of evidence that could be cited in the event of subsequent litigation. It was just a meeting. Mostly, it was courtesy being extended to Santa Barbara’s two representatives in the statehouse. It was not legally required.

About 5 p.m. on December 7, Hart said he got an email from the staffer in the governor’s office who had been party to the December 4 meeting. Call me, it said. Hart was informed that individuals higher up in the governor’s office — higher up over the Fire Marshal — had other thoughts. The Fire Marshal, they had determined, was not the appropriate entity to convene a public meeting. As state agencies go, the Fire Marshal’s office does not hold public hearings; its decisions are typically made behind closed doors with an air of papal infallibility and Vatican secrecy. To the extent the courtesy of a public process was extended to Santa Barbara, Hart said, he was told that perhaps the California Coastal Commission or the State Lands Commission — both of whom wield some degree of authority over aspects of Sable’s proposal — would provide that forum.

Still, he was less than thrilled by how things played out. “It was a complete about-face. There was no warning. No advance notice. This was the exact opposite of what was promised,” he said. “I never experienced anything like this: a direct promise that was not kept.”

Limón was not happy either. “Clearly, I am disappointed that the waiver was been approved despite a commitment there would be a community discussion between the state agencies involved and the community of Santa Barbara first. This is a setback. But in my eight years here, there have been setbacks involved in every major decision I’ve been involved with. It’s not over by any means.”

The agencies with jurisdiction and oversight that have yet to weigh in on key decision points include the California State Fire Marshal, the California Coastal Commission, the State Lands Commission, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, the Division of Oil Spill Prevention and Response, and the California Geologic Energy Management Division.