Oil Drilling Controversy

Boyarsky uses several direct quotes by me. These quotes were taken out of context from my 1967 report “Geology and Oil Productive Possibilities of (the) City of Santa Monica.”

From two different areas of the Santa Monica City report of 1967: On page 2, I state, “The offshore area adjacent to the south boundary should be considered a strong probably producing area.” On page 15, I state, “Mr. A.O. Spaulding gives this pool 10 million barrels of recoverable reserves. Based on only very meager information it appears that the field could be much larger than this and even approach the Playa del Rey-Venice Oil Field which has already produced 61 million barrels of oil.”

The above direct quotes are in regard to the Venice-South Santa Monica area and are well-defined in the report.

Under the heading “Seeking Oil Offshore,” Boyarsky says, “There may be even more oil in the vicinity of Occidental’s Palisades drill site, not beneath it, but a short distance out in Santa Monica Bay.” He then quotes me as follows: “There is a great probability of oil underlying the tidelands . . . the offshore area may contain more than 50 million barrels.”

This last statement by Boyarsky is taken out of context. He has taken both quotes, roughly combined them and taken them from the Venice-South Santa Monica border and used them for the Palisades-Occidental drill site offshore area. This is a distance of over 2 1/2 miles and my quote cannot apply to the Palisades offshore for many reasons. The most important reason is that Venice-South Santa Monica offshore produces oil while the Palisades offshore is really an unknown with very little data available.

Under the heading “Caused a Controversy,” he states that I was a geologist who helped Occidental identify its Palisades field. I was never involved in the Palisades Oil Field until long after it was discovered. Occidental later retained me to study the subsidence possibilities of the Palisades Oil Field, and appear as an expert witness.

I have never been on the inside at Occidental, but I did have data prepared by them and it is my opinion that Occidental is only interested in the Palisades Oil Field and not the offshore. The Palisades Oil Field is a proven, tested and discovered oil field, while the offshore is only a possibility that may or may not exist.

TED L. BEAR

Fillmore