A pipeline rupture that spilled an estimated 101,000 gallons of crude oil near Santa Barbara last month occurred along a badly corroded section that had worn away to a fraction of an inch in thickness, according to federal regulators.
It is our hope that President Obama – who took his first trip after being nominated for president to a Pennsylvania biodiesel plant – will hear our voices and instruct the EPA to follow through on diversifying U.S. transportation fuels.
In the Central Valley, persistent poverty and outdoor air pollution levels combine to produce the highest rates of ER visits for childhood asthma in the state. While particulate matter and ozone air pollution levels are declining somewhat in the region, they still can be high enough to trigger asthma attacks.
Pipes break. Equipment malfunctions. Human beings screw up. So long as oil is pumped from underground oil reservoirs — a technology both ingenious and violent — there will be spills.
Plains Pipeline, the large Texas-based company responsible for the pipe that ruptured in Santa Barbara County, has accumulated 175 safety and maintenance infractions since 2006, according to federal records.
A ruptured pipeline in Goleta leaked an estimated 21,000 gallons of crude oil Tuesday, some of which flowed into the ocean off Santa Barbara County, authorities said.
Shell Oil president Marvin Odum said: “These are potentially very large resources, but resources that would come online 10, 15, 20 years from now. So the current oil price is actually somewhat irrelevant. The size of the resource is what’s important.”
The state’s oil and gas agency has missed the deadline for reporting on the use of water by oil producers in California, saying that the large volume of information required could not be processed in time.
On top of economic losses of $14.5 billion, 4 million missed workdays, and $700 million in lost productivity each year, allergies make people (millions of them) feel miserable. And a new report out today says climate change could make pollen pack an even greater punch.
There’s plenty of oil in the Chukchi Sea, but accessing it—let alone cleaning it up if some of it spills—poses some serious logistical hurdles.
