For the second time a week, the judges sided with an environmental group that challenged the offshore oil business along the Santa Barbara County coastline and was challenging to grant temporary restraining orders to the company.
On Tuesday, Santa Barbara County Superior Court Judge Donna Gack ordered the offices of Sable Offshore Corporation and the former state fire service s to resume efforts in the operational land pipeline system, which suffered from a major break and spill in 2015.
Sable has been working on reactivating the so-called Santa Ynez unit, a complex of three offshore platforms, processing facilities and pipelines that were closed after the spill. The fire service regulates oil and gas pipelines throughout the state and must approve a full reopening of the pipeline. This is key to the company’s commercial success.
The court’s temporary restraining order regarding Pipeline’s work will remain in effect until at least July 18th, when GECK calls a full hearing on the matter. You can extend the order.
Sable officials said in their Securities and Exchange Commission application that the decision would force them to push back the timeline for restarts.
“Sable is currently targeting its first sale on August 1, 2025 due to this delay,” Filing said. Last month, the company called for commercial operations to begin in July after it announced it had shocked the shock of environmental activists and some state authorities.
Sable’s vice president of environmental and government affairs, Steve Rush, wrote in a statement Wednesday that the ruling “does not hinder Sable’s preparations to resume important oil flows to lower California gas prices and stabilize supply.”
The ruling was praised by the Environmental Group and plaintiffs who alleged that the state firefighter s improperly issued a waiver of repair work “without carrying out environmental review or public processes as required by state and federal law.”
“It’s huge because they can’t do anything between now and July 18th,” said Linda Klopp, the chief advisor to the Environmental Defense Center. “It’s all going on without public disclosure, hearings, environmental reviews. We are trying to enforce laws requiring sables to go through the public process to be subject to scrutiny.”
The Biodiversity Centre had filed another similar lawsuit.
“We were all right when Sable resumed operations offshore without an announcement, so it’s safe to say that the company cannot resume these land pipelines while the court considers this case.” “It’s worth knowing what the harm is from the pipeline that caused such a catastrophic oil spill 10 years ago, and the decision to restart should not be made behind closed doors.”
Last week, another state judge ruled in another lawsuit that Sable cannot do any more work in the coastal area where some of these pipelines are carried out until the dispute with the California Coastal Commission is resolved.
In April, the Coastal Commission discovered that Sable had repeatedly violated coastal law by repairing and upgrading its oil pipeline without the necessary permit or approval, and fined $18 million. Sable disputes these findings and argues that it follows all state and federal requirements that implement plans “exceed industry standards.”
However, the 2015 Refugio oil spill remains large for many residents.
“The community I represent made that clear. We don’t want another oil to spill out of the coast,” state Sen. Monique Limon (D-Goreta) said in a statement. Lawmakers are working to pass bills that require more rigorous testing and public input for the reopening of such pipelines, and she wants to see the standards that apply to the project. She believes that is possible if these court injunctions are extended.
Kara Garrett, a spokesman for the former Fire Department, said the agency is still reviewing the judge’s decision as “planning our compliance plans.”
“We will continue to focus on ensuring the safety of dangerous liquid pipelines under authorities within California,” Garrett said in a statement.
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