Wilson Seeks to Block New Coast Drilling : Environment: Governor asks Interior secretary to prevent offshore oil activity near three Southland counties and halt proposed sale of 87 new leases because of “extreme environmental sensitivity.”

Gov. Pete Wilson, in direct opposition to the Bush Administration, said Tuesday that offshore oil drilling should not be permitted in 176 tracts off the coast of Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties.

In his first policy statement on offshore oil drilling since becoming governor, Wilson called on the Interior Department to prevent oil drilling in some tracts already leased to oil companies and to halt a proposed sale of 87 new leases.

The Republican governor, detailing his objections in a letter to Interior Secretary Manuel Lujan, said the outer continental shelf from Oxnard to Morro Bay includes areas of “extreme environmental sensitivity” where drilling should not be allowed.

Wilson has long opposed offshore oil drilling. But as governor, his stand marks a sharp departure from the policies of his predecessor, Gov. George Deukmejian, who favored offshore drilling in many areas.

Instead of increasing offshore oil production, Wilson said, California and the nation should reduce the use of oil and find different sources of energy.

“California is continuing and expanding its conservation and alternative energy programs,” Wilson said in the letter to Lujan. “The net contribution of our existing transportation policies will be to reduce oil demand by a greater amount than can be supplied by the California OCS (outer continental shelf).”

The governor’s statement came in response to the Interior Department’s announcement in February that it would lease 87 new tracts, totaling about 500,000 acres, off Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties.

Last year, President Bush declared a moratorium on drilling off the coast of California until after the year 2,000, but the ban did not include the area from Oxnard to Morro Bay, where oil drilling has gone on for decades.

In his letter, Wilson urged the Bush Administration to consider a broader prohibition on new drilling off the California coast. However, the governor said if the federal government insists on allowing drilling, it should first address the effect of oil production on the coastal and marine environment, including the degradation of air quality, water quality and commercial fishing.

The 87 tracts that Lujan has proposed leasing to oil companies are near areas where offshore oil wells already are operating. For the most part, they are farther out to sea than existing wells, but some are proposed for waters just over three miles from the coast near Ventura, Carpinteria, Pt. Conception and the San Luis Obispo area.

The governor noted that some of the tracts proposed for oil drilling are next to the Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary. Twenty-three tracts were deleted from earlier federal drilling plans because they are in the habitat of the sea otter, Wilson said.

“The potential lease sale for 87 tracts in Santa Maria Basin and Santa Barbara Channel should be deleted,” the governor said.

Apart from opposing the new leases, Wilson sought to prevent drilling on 89 leases sold during the past two decades where drilling has not begun. Some of these leases were granted so long ago that they lack many of the environmental restrictions imposed on newer leases, state officials said. Wilson is not seeking to shut producing wells.

The governor pointed out that California already produces 13% of the nation’s oil supply and is the only state not on the Gulf of Mexico with oil production in the outer continental shelf.

Furthermore, the amount of oil that would be produced by the new wells is less than the amount California expects to save through energy conservation measures that have already been adopted, Wilson said.

Wilson acknowledged that California’s energy demands will increase in the coming years, but pledged to develop an energy plan that will reduce California’s dependence on oil.