State Board Bans New Offshore Oil, Gas Leases

In a new blow to the petroleum industry, the State Lands Commission on Wednesday declared all remaining unleased or unprotected coastal waters in Southern California off limits to oil and gas development.

The move outlawed new oil or gas leases for all of Orange County’s coastline, from the high-tide mark onshore to three miles offshore. The three-mile strip of state-owned coastal waters already was protected south of Huntington Beach to San Diego. The State Lands Commission’s vote on Wednesday expanded that sanctuary to include all state waters off Huntington Beach, Sunset Beach and Seal Beach.

“I would say that I’m ecstatic,” said Laguna Beach Councilman Robert F. Gentry, who heads a coalition of Orange County coastal communities opposed to offshore oil drilling. “The State Lands Commission is responding to the will of the people of Orange County in protecting our very precious (coastline) resource.”

Wednesday’s decision followed a similar commission ban last year covering waters off Humboldt and Mendocino counties and now means that for the first time all new oil and gas drilling in state waters from Oregon to Mexico has been shut down. The action also provided evidence of the continuing repercussions from the disastrous Alaskan oil spill last March.

Wednesday’s move does not require approval by the governor, state Legislature or federal government. However, the Lands Commission could reverse itself in the future and the state Legislature could overturn the decision.

While the move does not affect waters outside the three-mile limit, President Bush and Congress in separate actions earlier this year locked out new oil and gas leasing activity in federal waters off California until at least next June. Slightly more than half of the oil produced off the California coast occurs in federal waters beyond the three-mile limit.

“The world has changed since the Valdez accident,” Controller Gray Davis, a member of the commission, said Wednesday. “We’ve learned we can’t afford to gamble with California’s coastline,” Davis said.

“It’s just sheer dumb luck we haven’t experienced the same catastrophic accident,” added Lt. Gov. Leo T. McCarthy, another commission member.

On a 2-0 vote, Davis and McCarthy set aside 310 square miles of ocean tracts located between the northern city limits of Newport Beach and Point Fermin in Los Angeles County, and all offshore lands in Ventura and Santa Barbara counties.

The new sanctuary area established Wednesday is believed to hold between 100 million and 300 million barrels of crude oil valued at between $500 million and $1 billion at today’s prices.

Most oil rigs off Orange County are along the Huntington Beach shoreline. Huntington Beach City Administrator Paul E. Cook on Wednesday praised the commission’s ban on further leases off the city’s shores.

“I personally think the visual blight caused by oil drilling off our shores is offensive,” Cook said. “Our city hasn’t been getting any new revenue from any of the new offshore rigs that have been popping up out there, so we get all the visual blight and no income from it.”

Huntington Beach City Councilman Peter M. Green, an environmentalist who opposes expansion of offshore drilling, said the real danger to Orange County’s coastline is in the federally controlled waters beyond the three-mile limit. “I’m more concerned about what the federal government plans to do,” Green said Wednesday.

In May, the coalition of coastal cities released a study made by a Virginia-based environmental consulting firm about the potential dangers of offshore drilling to Orange County. The $235,000 study said intensive offshore oil and gas drilling would severely cut the value of oceanfront property, and could reduce the local tourist trade by $223 million a year.

Oil industry interest in drilling in the newly created sanctuary areas off Orange and Los Angeles counties was said by the commission staff to be “modest.”

Wednesday’s vote came despite protests from the oil industry, which pleaded for a “balanced” view that took national security and economic issues into account as well as environmental factors.

Terry Covington, spokeswoman for the Western States Petroleum Assn. and the California Coastal Operators Group, said California oil would minimize dependence on foreign oil. She also reminded the commission that since 1980 an estimated $3.5 billion in oil royalties have been paid into the state treasury, a good portion of it earmarked for education.

“At a time when the state must increase the sales tax to provide earthquake relief, it is not a time to cast aside this economic contribution to the state’s welfare,” Covington said.

BACKGROUND

In October, 1988, the State Lands Commission imposed a ban on oil and gas drilling in state waters off the coasts of Humboldt and Mendocino counties. Last Feb. 9, President Bush announced a postponement of leasing in all federal waters--those beyond three miles from shore--in Northern and Central California, and Congress later imposed a ban in federal waters off Central California. A presidential task force on offshore drilling is scheduled to report back to Bush next month.

Staff writer Bill Billiter contributed to this story.

PROTECTED WATERS

This map shows areas of state waters declared off-limits Wednesday to oil and gas development, areas already declared sanctuaries and areas where oil and gas leases already have been approved. It also includes a small stretch of unleased land under local jurisdiction near Long Beach.

Source: State Lands Commission