Oil Comes Within 3 Miles of Beaches

A thin sheen of oil from an offshore leak came within three miles of Newport Beach and Huntington Beach as cleanup continued Friday.

Officials don’t know when the seepage from a corroded pipeline more than 700 feet underwater will end, but said considerable progress has been made in recovering oil from the ocean’s surface.

“What’s been good news for us today is that the overall size of the sheen is reduced by two-thirds,” said Susan Hersberger, a spokeswoman for Aera Energy LLC of Bakersfield.

The 300-gallon leak began Sunday near a three-platform complex owned by Aera about 10 miles off Huntington Beach. An inactive pipeline, which connects platform Eureka with platforms Elly and Ellen, was being cleaned when residual oil began seeping from seven known pinhole-size leaks.

The pipeline was shut down after a June leak of about 420 gallons that sent gooey black tar balls onshore at the pristine Crystal Cove State Park.

On Friday, Aera had 22 containment boats, over 14,000 feet of deployed boom, four recovery vessels, three spotter boats, one barge and two helicopters involved in the cleanup. The company is also constantly flushing the pipeline with water to force out the last of the residual oil and used a remote-operation vehicle to confirm the source of the leaks Friday afternoon, said John Limousin, Aera’s manager of operations in the Los Angeles area.

So far, workers have recovered 610 gallons of emulsified oil and water from the ocean’s surface. But it is impossible to tell exactly how much of the mousse-like substance is actually oil.

The California Public Interest Research Group will use the cleanup efforts as a backdrop when it releases a petition and survey at noon today at the Huntington Beach Pier that says the majority of Californians oppose offshore drilling.

A survey of 640 people at grocery stores and shopping centers throughout the state found that 60% believe there should be a permanent ban on drilling off California’s coast and 74% do not think offshore drilling is safe for the environment, according to the advocacy group.

The deadline for the U.S. Department of the Interior to renew 36 untapped offshore leases in federal waters off the state’s coast is Nov. 16. CalPIRG officials are urging the Clinton administration to allow the untapped leases to expire.

The group has also collected signatures from 25,000 people who are calling on presidential candidates to oppose offshore drilling. Former Sen. Bill Bradley and Vice President Al Gore have already announced that if elected they would ban drilling off California’s and Florida’s coasts.

The ongoing spill “makes an obvious point about why we shouldn’t have any more offshore oil drilling off our coast,” said Jill Horwitz, a CalPIRG campus organizer. “The risks are just too great.”

The Department of the Interior has concluded that there is a 94% risk of a major oil spill off the California coast within the next 30 years, according to CalPIRG.