Carrizo Plain, Calif.—Last month, the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation notified an oil company that it must conduct the highest level of environmental review before moving forward with plans to conduct oil exploration in the Carrizo Plain National Monument. The agency’s decision was in response to demands by a coalition of conservation organizations, including ForestWatch, to prepare a full Environmental Impact Statement before approving the use of thumper trucks and explosives to search for oil in this ecologically critical area in San Luis Obispo County.
Vintage Production LLC, a subsidiary of oil giant Occidental Petroleum Corp., owns 30,000 acres of mineral rights on the valley floor of the Carrizo Plain National Monument. Vintage first announced plans to exploit these mineral rights in March 2008, and filed a formal application the following month. The notice announced plans to conduct seismic testing along a five-mile stretch of the Carrizo Plain National Monument’s valley floor using dynamite or giant thumper trucks.
Both methods would cause significant ground disturbance that would affect the sensitive ecology of this fragile area, particularly for endangered wildlife like the giant kangaroo rat, the San Joaquin kit fox, and the blunt-nosed leopard lizard, all of which live in the area in underground burrows.
These concerns formed the basis of a letter from a coalition of conservation organizations to the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, demanding that the agency fully evaluate the environmental impacts of exploration activities on the National Monument. Specifically, the groups urged the BLM to prepare a full EIS before approving the exploration permit. A full EIS, the groups argued, was required to comply with federal environmental laws as well as to ensure the protection of rare wildlife and habitat in the exploration area.
Last month, the U.S. Bureau of Land Management notified Vintage that the company would be required to prepare a full EIS. “After conducting a preliminary biological survey for threatened and endangered species and considering the heightened significant public interest associated with conducting a project such as this within a national monument, BLM has determined that an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) is required due to the potential significant impacts to the unique characteristics of the monument,” said the BLM letter.
What’s Next
ForestWatch will continue to track this issue to protect the Carrizo Plain National Monument from runaway oil development. What little oil remains in the monument is not worth the damage that could occur from using thumper trucks and explosives in this ecologically fragile area.
The BLM may release a draft EIS for public review and comment later this year. That draft EIS and any public hearings associated with it will be posted to this website, so stay tuned!
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