California challenges federal takeover of two oil pipelines

(This story was updated to add new information.)

California is challenging an agency under the Department of Transportation for giving the “green light” to a company to restart pumping oil through pipelines officials said have been federalized.

Against the backdrop of ocean waves at Dockweiler State Beach, Attorney General Rob Bonta said on Friday, Jan. 23 that the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration has unlawfully given Sable Offshore Corp. the “green light” to restart pumping oil through two onshore pipelines that start from Santa Barbara County and end in Kern County.

In a petition for review filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, the attorney general argued that PHMSA issued an order to assume federal jurisdiction over a pair of pipelines.

According to Bonta, these pipelines are solely located in California and yet it has been reclassified as “interstate.” He described the move as lawfully federalizing the pipelines and “usurped state control.”

“This pipeline was regulated for decades, under both Republican and Democratic administrations, as an interstate pipeline,” a PHMSA spokesperson said in an email to the USA TODAY Network. “The Las Flores pipeline was only redesignated as intrastate in 2016 when it was taken out of service. Based on the facts presented by Sable in their letter to us last November, PHMSA agreed with the operator that returning the pipeline to our jurisdiction was appropriate.”

It comes after the Trump administration began unveiling plans to restart oil operations off California’s coast, a move that quickly prompted concern from advocates who warn the move could harm the environment, including through oil spills.

“PHMSA’s approval of Sable’s restart of this potentially dangerous pipeline is the latest example of Trump doing the oil industry’s bidding,” Bonta said.

One of the pipelines previously ruptured, which led to the Refugio oil spill along the state’s coast in 2015, Bonta said.

Sable, which is headquartered in Houston, said on its website that restarting both the Santa Ynez Unit and the Las Flores Pipeline System — the latter the subject of Bonta’s legal challenge on Jan. 23 — “will bring critical energy and economic opportunity” to the state. More specifically, it’ll bring energy to a “state with the highest gas prices in the country,” a spokesperson with PHMSA said.

Last November, the Department of the Interior announced its plans to end a “restrictive” Biden administration-era 2024–2029 National Outer Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Leasing Program, which was then described by the department as “the fewest oil and gas lease sales in history.”

The new proposal includes “as many as 34 potential offshore lease sales” off coasts that include the Pacific, according to the Department of the Interior.

The news had prompted objection by environmental nonprofit the Surfrider Foundation.

“The Surfrider Foundation urges the federal administration to adopt a 5-year offshore oil and gas program with no new lease sales,” the foundation said in November. “Such action will protect valuable marine and coastal ecosystems, as well as the communities and businesses that depend on these resources.”

Paris Barraza is a reporter covering Los Angeles and Southern California for the USA TODAY Network. Reach her at pbarraza@usatodayco.com.