Gavin Newsom’s late session proposal to extend deadlines — by more than four years in one case — for oil companies to comply with a new law fizzled and died late this week.
But environmental groups didn’t have a chance to cheer a rare victory over California’s fossil fuel interests: When the governor’s administration withdrew the proposal, it also eliminated from the budget bill any funding to implement the 2022 law — a law that prohibits new oil operations within 3,200 feet of homes and schools and calls for a robust monitoring system to track leaks and air and water quality.
State agencies maintained that the deadlines for implementing many of the law’s requirements were never practical and did not allow sufficient time to hire staff to oversee a new state program, or to understand and put in place the complex monitoring and testing regimes to ensure public health.
While some of the law’s elements are already in place — no new oil or gas wells are now permitted within the buffer zone, for example — leak detection protocols and other critical monitoring elements have yet to be determined.