Refugio Oil Pipeline Startup Back at Santa Barbara County on Tuesday

The question of installing safety valves on the pipeline that caused the Refugio Oil Spill in 2015 arrives at the Board of Supervisors hearing room this coming Tuesday, August 22. What seems like a painless decision to limit the oil spilled from a rupture — especially for Supervisor Das Williams, who authored the law requiring the valves — was heard previously by the Planning Commission, which decided that automatic shutoff valves would inevitably lead to crude oil again flowing along the coast and voted them down.

The missing part of the puzzle during the Planning Commission’s hearing in April was the present state of the pipeline, though opponents charged extensive corrosion was likely and no repairs were made except to the obvious rupture. In answer, Exxon’s attorney stated the pipeline was holding pressure without leaks.

After the 2015 spill, investigators had found that water had seeped under the insulation around the steel pipe and corroded the metal to the breaking point. Plains All American Pipeline was found guilty of criminal negligence in the Refugio spill in part because its pipeline tests had failed to detect the corrosion that caused the spill. The pipeline has been moribund since the 2015 oil spill; however, with the transfer of ownership of the pipeline from Plains to ExxonMobil in October 2022, any reports about repairs or maintenance of Line 901 are made to the federal pipeline authority and to the Office of the State Fire Marshal, not to the County of Santa Barbara.