Apparently, Los Angeles Has Banned Oil Production in the City
Most folks who talk about oil production know very little about it. One reality of oil production, particularly for older fields like those around Los Angeles, is that oil wells have to be frequently reworked to maintain such production (fracking, by the way, is one of those rework techniques and has been used for over 50 years). By banning well rework and re-injection of water (most fluid flowing from older wells is water), the city council has effectively banned oil production.
The linked article is a good reminder of a technique used by many environmental activists. Despite portraying themselves as being driven by science, they actually often make progress by taking words and both obscuring their meaning and adding emotional baggage to them. Such is the case with "fracking"
Because with its pun-friendly name, the term fracking has become an effective nonspecific rallying point for extreme activist groups aiming to scare the public about environmental harms that have yet to be demonstrated. Amid the cheering after the vote, some of the national activists behind the effort acknowledged the true goal behind measure. The term fracking, it seems, is actually intended to be a catch-all phrase to describe all aspects of oil and gas production, conventional and unconventional alike, according to Washington-based Food and Water Watch, one of the activist groups behind the measure. In an interview with online publication Streetsblog Los Angeles after the vote, FWW organizer Brenna Norton boldly stated as much when she acknowledged, “It’s easier to engage and organize people around ‘fracking’ than a complicated list of practices.”
Matthew Slyfield:
There are/were working oil fields inside the city limits of LA? Learn something new every day.
March 28, 2014, 11:19 amSTW:
The La Brea Tar Pits formed because some of the oil was so close to the service that it would bubble up and you can't get any more in the middle of town than they are. As I recall, Beverly Hills High has/had a working well on the school grounds. Old pictures of Signal Hill down near the harbor show it covered with oil derricks. Several oil companies were once headquartered in LA but now seem to be fleeing the city and state. Sadly, the unicorn fart factory slated to cover much of the state's energy needs is way behind schedule; I believe there's some difficulty with raw materials and the Environmental Impact Statement.
March 28, 2014, 12:06 pmBram:
I lived in LA 20 years ago. It was cool to see the pumps at some of the parks.
How stupid to ban oil production in a city that worships the automobile.
March 28, 2014, 12:53 pmMorven:
Looks like it's not actually banned yet, the approval was for a draft version not the final. Still disturbing.
And yes, LA County is covered in working oil wells. Most of them are, these days, very low production (they're old wells in nearly exhausted fields) but they're still getting sufficient oil out of them to make running the pumps a cost-effective measure.
March 28, 2014, 1:44 pmMatthew Slyfield:
"Sadly, the unicorn fart factory slated to cover much of the state's
energy needs is way behind schedule; I believe there's some difficulty
with raw materials and the Environmental Impact Statement."
They also have zoning issues. The area they want to build in isn't zoned for livestock. :)
March 28, 2014, 2:48 pmrandian:
I'm surprised they haven't banned offshore oil work yet, like Florida stupidly did.
March 28, 2014, 3:04 pmReal American:
Very little oil production in Los Angeles County is within Los Angeles city limits. Most is in other cities or unincorporated areas.
April 3, 2014, 10:09 pm