County to consider including fracking in permitting process

Tuesday afternoon about 40 residents of the County - representing communities from Ojai to Oxnard - attended the Ventura County Board of Supervisors hearing on hydraulic fracturing or fracking.

The meeting was a “receive and file” agenda item, meant for the Supervisors to hear the County CEO responses to questions the Board had about fracking. 

Fracking is a process using water, sand and chemicals injected at high pressures into deep hard rock formations to fracture the rock and release the oil and gas sealed inside. The California oil industry is preparing to extract the 15.4 billion barrels held underground within the Monterey Shale formation. 

State regulators, Tim Kustic, State Oil and Gas Director, and Bruce Hesson, Ventura District Deputy, both with the California Department of Conservation, Division of Oil, Gas and Geothermal Resources (DOGGR) also spoke and answered questions at the hearing. 

“Fracking is like eating a jar of jalapeños,” said Noah Aist, age 10, a resident of Ventura. “What you do today might bite you in the butt tomorrow.” His joke kicked off the hearing. Aist and his 12 year-old sister Emmma Aist were present holding signs expressing their distaste with the prospect of fracking.

There are no regulations on the books in California specific to fracking. DOGGR is conducting public workshops to receive input on their discussion draft fracking regulations. The next workshop is scheduled for noon to 8 p.m. on Friday, April 19 in Santa Barbara, at the University Club located at 1332 Santa Barbara Street. Once the formal rulemaking process begins, it may take 18 months for regulations to take effect.

Local governments across the nation are grappling with public outcry over the lack of transparency, and regulation of fracking. Several bills are proposed in the California legislature which if passed would impose an oil severance tax, disclosure of chemicals, public notice, reporting of water sourcing, water usage and how frack fluids are handled after the process. 

“We can’t just say no to fracking,” said Supervisor Steve Bennett, in noticing signs in the room calling for the Board to stop fracking in the County. “The Board of Supervisors doesn’t have that authority [according to County Counsel].”

“No, you cannot say no to fracking,” said Leroy Smith of County Counsel. “You can deny permits.” 

County land use rules require operators to get conditional use permits (CUP) for new wells that are not included in the original permit. CUPs must also be obtained for any activity on land not included in an existing CUP. Operators must also notify and receive approval from DOGGR to drill new wells, rework a well, or abandon a well - whether they are part of an existing CUP or not. DOGGR depends on operators for notification of when new wells are drilled, reworked or abandoned.

“There are older CUPs, granted in the 60’s,” said Bennett. “Many with no end date. I’m going to ask [staff to report back] on what extent we can get back some authority over these CUPs that have no end date. And with new wells, not in an area with a CUP, can we require as part of the permit process that they inform us whether they will be fracking or not?” 

“Yes, as part of the application process,” said Smith. “If they do not exclude it, we can assume they want to frack and use all modern extraction techniques, so the environmental review that the application would have to go through would include the assumption that fracking would occur, and all the environmental aspects of that would have to be analyzed.” Smith clarified that the State is responsible for all “subsurface” regulations and the County is responsible for overseeing surface activities through its authority to regulate land use. According to Smith, through that power, the County can include disclosure of an operator’s intent to frack a well in the permit application process that is now in place.