ENERGY

California Pipeline Project Gets Key Approval: Angeles National Forest officials agreed to issue a right of way for a proposed pipeline that will ship crude oil from California’s Central Valley to refineries around Los Angeles. The approval covers the right to build, operate and maintain a crude pipeline and related facilities in national forest lands. Forest supervisor Michael Roger said the pipeline would be environmentally preferable to other alternatives to ship the crude. Chevron Corp., Texaco Inc. and Unocal Corp., partners in the proposed 130,000-barrel-a-day, 132-mile Pacific Pipeline, now carry crude to their Los Angeles refineries by truck, train and ship because of a lack of pipeline capacity. The pipeline still needs the approval of California’s Public Utilities Commission and certain local jurisdictions through which the line would pass.