jan. 26-Feb. 2, 2017
Goleta Gas Mea Culpa
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THE INDEPENDENT
FEbruary 2, 2017
independent.com
cou rtesy
T
he mea culpas flow thick
and humbly throughout the county Office of Emergency Management wrap-up of the Ellwood Canyon hydrogen sulfide release last October, and the agencies involved are changing procedures and buying equipment to avoid a repeat of the delayed public notice. But western Goleta residents downwind of the release, BIG STINK: Hydrogen sulfide from an ag water well sent who have stewed for three the toxic gas downwind as far as the Ellwood Bluffs back in months over the incident, October 2016. want more to be done, they told the Goleta City Council on January 17. The Santa Barbara Independent that his wife The drillers, an outfit from New Mexico, developed a headache and that neighbors were just outside city borders, putting in an said they had nosebleeds from the toxic gas. Speakers at the Goleta Council asked agricultural well on October 9, 2016, when they hit a pocket of hydrogen sulfide (H2S) why the outside monitor up Hollister at 3,250 feet around 4 a.m. They didn’t report Avenue from Venoco’s Ellwood Onshore it to the state or the county. Their county Facility, lost in a turnover of property permit didn’t explicitly require it, though owners, was never replaced. Mark Kram, state law does. Over the course of 16 hours, whose company creates maps from monitor Fire Station 11’s crew searched for the source, information, believes a series of detectors starting at around 5 a.m. after getting a call are needed. A group of students at UCSB, from Mark Kram, a hydrogeologist who he said, “are working on a grant to set up a lives on Ellwood Bluffs and has experience system of monitors.” working in oil fields. More than 24 hours The well permitting agency, which is elapsed after the spill before the first public part of County Public Health, is putting notification went out, during which time together a notice to drillers to detail how worried western Goleta residents emailed hydrogen sulfide releases must be reported. each other, the county CEO’s office, and A call to county dispatch by the property posted to NextDoor. owner or the drillers would have alerted In the October event, people were authorities immediately, many pointed out exposed to somewhere between 10-15 ppm at the Goleta Council meeting. According to — the level on the drillers’ personal detec- Larry Fay, director of Environmental Health tion monitors—and 3.6 ppm, the highest Services—an agency absent from the meetlevel on Venoco’s fence-line monitors about ing, as Councilmember Michael Bennett two miles away. The state puts the ambi- criticized—if County Counsel approves the ent air quality level for H2S at 0.03 ppm for new language, it should be a permit requirepublic health and odor nuisance. Kram told ment by mid-February. —Jean Yamamura
County Circles Wagons in Greka Case
T
he Santa Barbara County Counsel’s
office is fighting efforts by the oil company formerly known as Greka Oil—now HVI Cat Canyon—to depose former county supervisor Salud Carbajal, now a member of Congress. Attorneys for HVI are seeking to depose Carbajal to explore whether in 2008 he lobbied state and federal environmental agencies, such as California Fish and Wildlife and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), to “destroy Greka.” At that time, Greka’s North County oil production facilities were plagued by sustained problems, giving rise to multiple leaks and spills. These, in turn, sparked federal and state lawsuits against the oil company, which remain unresolved. Mary Pat Barry—an attorney with the County Counsel’s office—dismissed HVI’s deposition subpoena as a “fishing expedition,” adding the information sought is legally irrelevant. Former Greka president Andrew DeVegvar has claimed under oath that he’d
been told in 2008 by the EPA’s Robert Wise that Carbajal summoned a group of state and federal regulators to “destroy Greka.” According to Barry, the EPA’s Wise testified under oath he’d never said that. Carbajal’s press spokesperson also denied it. Barry also argued that Carbajal — as a county supervisor—lacked the authority to trigger the ensuing litigation that’s been filed against Greka, which between 2005 and 2010 amassed a record of environmental notoriety and fines still unrivaled in Santa Barbara County. Barry also claimed that Carbajal—as an “apex” official—enjoyed limited immunity from such subpoenas. Greka eventually paid the County of Santa Barbara $2 million as part of a settlement over widespread environmental transgressions. The state and federal litigation was sidetracked when it turned out state environmental regulators had lost computerized inspection records and failed to disclose this to the court. Greka sought to have the entire case tossed because of this. —Nick Welsh