Saving Seafood

Suit: Agencies fail to protect marine species from oil

January 27, 2022 — A conservation group says in a lawsuit that the U.S. government failed to protect endangered whales and other animals by underestimating the potential for an oil spill like a recent crude pipeline leak off California’s coast.

The Center for Biological Diversity filed a lawsuit in federal court Wednesday saying Interior Department agencies and the National Marine Fisheries Service didn’t ensure offshore oil and gas production wouldn’t jeopardize endangered and threatened species in accordance with U.S. law.

The lawsuit says the Service found in a 2017 analysis that oil and gas production wouldn’t likely have an adverse effect on threatened marine life off California’s coast, there was a low likelihood of an offshore oil spill and if one occurred, it would likely involve no more than 8,400 gallons (31,800 liters). The suit asks the court to vacate the analysis and bar new oil activity unless government agencies comply with the law protecting endangered species.

Read the full story from the Associated Press

 

CALIFORNIA: Oil spill cleanup improves, fisheries to stay closed longer

November 8, 2021 — Five weeks after a ruptured underwater pipeline spilled crude in the waters off Southern California, cleanup crews have cleared about a third of the shoreline and the amount of oily waste collected is tapering, an official said Friday.

Fisheries remain closed and aren’t likely to reopen before the final week of the month, said Lt. Christian Corbo of the state Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Crews have removed upward of 500,000 pounds (227,000 kilograms) of tar balls, as well as oil-tainted sand, seaweed and driftwood. The amount of oily debris collected each day has tapered off, and more than a third of the shoreline is nearing final cleanup approval.

Read the full story at the AP

 

Feds offer loans to those harmed by California oil spill

October 28, 2021 — The federal government will offer disaster loans to businesses harmed by an oil spill that shut down Southern California shorelines earlier this month, it was announced Wednesday.

The U.S. Small Business Administration approved disaster assistance in the form of low-interest loans for Orange County, where the spill took place, along with nearby Los Angeles, Riverside, San Bernardino and San Diego counties.

The agency declared an “economic injury disaster” for the counties, making loans available for small businesses and agricultural cooperatives and private, non-profit organizations.

The deadline to apply for the loans is July 27, 2022. Applicants can sign up online at: https://disasterloanassistance.sba.gov/.

Read the full story from the Associated Press

Experts ask Congress for more offshore oil oversight as California cleanup continues

October 15, 2021 — Nearly two weeks after a pipeline ruptured and leaked tens of thousands of gallons of crude oil into the Pacific Ocean, environmental policy experts testified before Congress on Thursday, urging lawmakers to require more federal oversight of aging and abandoned offshore oil platforms and pipelines.

The recent spill off the Orange County coast has put the nation’s oil and gas infrastructure under new scrutiny. Some California lawmakers and environmental advocates have called for a prohibition on all future offshore drilling, while others want to extend a ban to companies already operating in state and federal waters.

In testimony before the House subcommittee on energy and mineral resources, offshore drilling experts painted a bleak picture of the federal government’s ability to ensure that oil and gas companies plug their old wells and dismantle existing platforms and pipelines. They warned that if Congress does not create financial incentives for the industry to pay the full cost of decommissioning its equipment, taxpayers will be stuck with the bill.

The cost could be astronomical. The federal government’s own estimates suggest that between $35 billion and $50 billion would be needed to plug offshore oil and gas wells that are no longer producing — or are no longer profitable. Meanwhile, companies have committed to financing only about $3.7 billion, less than a tenth of the expected cost.

Read the full story at the Los Angeles Times

 

Marine wildlife may suffer the consequences of SoCal’s oil spill for years to come

October 8, 2021 — “We’re scared to see what we’re going to find out,” Sarah Glitz, a marine scientist for Oceana, said of the Oct. 2 oil spill off the Southern California coast.

Glitz, like many scientists, has watched in horror as the ecological disaster unfurls along the coastline where about 126,000 gallons of crude oil seeped into the Pacific Ocean and indefinitely closed several Orange County beaches and fisheries.

Veterinarians are in the field tending to the injured animals that wash ashore. But it may be weeks, months, even years before the full extent of the disaster and impact on birds and marine mammals is known, Glitz said.

Already, 15 oiled birds have been recovered, two of which were dead, the Oiled Wildlife Care Network at  UC Davis reported.

Read the full story at SFGATE

 

CALIFORNIA: Fishermen and foodways begin to feel the squeeze of Orange County’s oil spill

October 7, 2021 — Over the weekend, spiny lobster fishermen in Southern California began setting traps for the start of their season. On Sunday, they were suddenly prohibited from entering a swath of the Orange County coastline, and on Tuesday, the banned area was extended even farther — without word on how long fishing will remain off-limits.

Their income from an entire season might have been contaminated in one of the largest oil spills in the state’s recent history.

A 17.7-mile oil pipeline off Huntington Beach has hemorrhaged at least 146,000 gallons into the Pacific since the leak began, possibly Friday, immediately threatening wildlife from sea to shore — and potentially contaminating the fishing grounds and aquafarms that feed Californians and keep hundreds of commercial fishermen employed.

The state Department of Fish and Wildlife has placed a temporary ban on commercial and recreational fishing in an area that stretches about 20 miles from Sunset Beach south to San Clemente and extends six miles out to sea. State officials, fishermen and chefs are scrambling to warn consumers of potential dangers and, in some cases, encouraging them to find new sources of seafood.

Read the full story at the Los Angeles Times

 

CALIFORNIA: Orange County oil spill renews calls to ban offshore drilling

October 6, 2021 — A massive oil spill off the Orange County coast that’s fouled beaches and ecologically sensitive wetlands in what officials are calling an environmental catastrophe has renewed calls to ban offshore drilling.

The spill, first reported Saturday morning but perhaps detected the night before, originated from a pipeline running from the Port of Long Beach to an offshore oil platform known as Elly. The failure caused as much as 144,000 gallons of oil to gush into the Catalina Channel.

In the days that followed, the spill has left crude along stretches of sand in Newport Beach, Laguna Beach and Huntington Beach, killing fish and birds and threatening sensitive marine habitats.

“The ecological and economic damage from this oil spill has the potential to reverberate for generations,” state Sen. Dave Min (D-Irvine) said this week. At a news conference Tuesday, Min called the spill “either a case of negligence or inaction.”

Read the full story at the Los Angeles Times

 

CALIFORNIA: More beaches closed amid questions about oil spill response

October 5, 2021 — Officials imposed more restrictions on Southern California beaches Tuesday in response to a large oil spill while more questions emerged about whether the accident was swiftly reported to the Coast Guard and other authorities.

Signs were posted on the famous Huntington Beach declaring that the beach was open but that the ocean and shore were closed. On a typical day, surfers would usually be seen bobbing in the waves, but not now. Huntington State Beach still had an oily smell, although it was less severe than the stench emanating from the water on Sunday.

Elsewhere, Orange County officials closed the Dana Point Harbor and a beach for small children. Those closures are in addition to other Dana Point beaches and all beaches in Laguna Beach.

The restrictions were announced a day after oil spill reports reviewed by The Associated Press raised questions about the Coast Guard’s response to one of the state’s largest recent spills and about how quickly Amplify Energy, the company operating three offshore platforms and the pipeline, recognized it had a problem and notified authorities.

The Coast Guard received the first report of a possible oil spill more than 12 hours before the company reported a major leak in its pipeline and a cleanup effort was launched, records show.

Two early calls about the spill came into the National Response Center, which is staffed by the Coast Guard and notifies other agencies of disasters for quick response. The first was from an anchored ship that noticed a sheen on the water. The second came six hours later from a federal agency that said a possible oil slick was spotted on satellite imagery, according to reports by the California Office of Emergency Services.

Read the full story from the Associated Press

 

‘Catastrophic’ California oil spill kills fish, damages wetlands

October 4, 2021 — A large oil spill off the southern California coast left fish dead, birds mired in petroleum and wetlands contaminated, in what local officials called an environmental catastrophe.

The U.S. Coast Guard, heading a clean-up response involving federal, state and city agencies, on Sunday announced an around-the-clock investigation into how the spill occurred.

An estimated 126,000 gallons, or 3,000 barrels, had spread into an oil slick covering about 13 square miles of the Pacific Ocean since it was first reported on Saturday morning, Kim Carr, the mayor of Huntington Beach, told a news conference.

She called the spill an “environmental catastrophe” and a “potential ecological disaster”. The beachside city, about 40 miles (65 km) south of Los Angeles, was bearing the brunt of the spill.

Read the full story at Reuters

Risk of oil spills may rise as climate change creates more monster storms

September 30, 2021 — Hurricane Ida left a trail of destruction after slamming into the Gulf Coast, but offshore the Category 4 storm left something else in its wake: oil spills.

Oil spills aren’t uncommon with strong storms, but as climate change pushes up sea levels and creates stronger storms with more moisture, offshore refineries are going to need greater and greater protections.

The Gulf of Mexico is “particularly vulnerable” because of the prevalence of storms, the low-lying geography, sea-level rise, receding shorelines and the presence of oil facilities, Christopher Vaccaro, a spokesman for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, told ABC News. Since offshore drilling began in the region in 1942, about 6,000 oil and gas structures have been installed in the Gulf of Mexico.

On Sept. 4, the day before Ida made landfall in Louisiana, the Coast Guard announced that cleanup crews already were responding to a large oil spill at an offshore drilling about 2 miles south of Port Fourchon, Louisiana.

Read the full story at ABC News