By Amy Harder
SALINAS, Calif. -- The movement to ban fracking is winning
victories across the U.S. Yet the campaign has largely failed to
win where it matters most -- in places oil and natural gas are
produced.
A Nov. 8 ballot measure will test that pattern in Monterey
County, famed for its farms and scenic coastline.
Two counties bordering Monterey, San Benito and Santa Cruz, have
banned fracking, although neither has a sizable oil industry.
Monterey's San Ardo oil field has been churning out crude for
nearly 70 years, and the county has no ban.
Measure Z, an initiative on Monterey County's ballot, seeks to
ban fracking and new wells, and to restrict how oil companies use
water byproducts.
The measure is being closely watched by national groups on both
sides. Its supporters have received donations and other help from
national environmental groups. Monterey County for Energy
Independence, which opposes it, has outspent backers roughly 30 to
1, according to election filings through Oct. 22, spending nearly
$5.5 million; it is funded almost entirely by Chevron Corp. and
Aera Energy LLC, a joint venture between Exxon Mobil Corp. and
Shell Oil. Co.
The fight has reached an intense pitch in Monterey County, home
to activists in both the environmental movement and oil industry.
It divides along what locals call the "lettuce curtain."
On one side are inland farm regions, with fields ranging from
lettuce to wine grapes, where voters tend to be politically more
conservative and to oppose Measure Z. On the other are residents
living nearer the coast, often liberal-leaning politically, who
tend to favor the ban.
Public opinion is increasingly turning against hydraulic
fracturing, in which water and sand laced with chemicals are
injected underground to unlock oil and natural gas, along with
other extraction techniques. A March Gallup poll found 51% of
Americans opposed fracking, up 11 points from a survey a year
earlier.
Of hundreds of anti-fracking and similar measures across the
country, almost all are where there is little or no oil or gas
production. New York banned fracking in 2014 but doesn't have a
sizable oil industry, though that move did head off any potential
growth of the sector there. Vermont banned fracking in 2012 but has
no commercial natural gas or oil resources.
Where fossil fuels are produced in any significant quantity by
any method, such measures have generally failed. In Colorado,
activists couldn't gather enough signatures to get two
anti-fracking measures on the ballot this year. Voters in Denton,
Texas, passed a binding measure against fracking, but the state
quickly passed a law banning local bans.
Among the legally binding bans passed in Pennsylvania over the
past few years, none are in areas where companies are producing in
the Marcellus Shale natural-gas formation in any large quantity,
according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of government data of
active wells and a tally of bans compiled by anti-fracking group
Food and Water Watch.
Monterey County has a storied place on the American landscape,
with Big Sur's cliff-side Highway 1, acres of green fields that
inspired John Steinbeck and the 1967 Monterey Pop festival
featuring the likes of Jimi Hendrix.
It is also California's 4th-largest oil-producing county,
although there are currently no fracking operations in the county.
Chevron and Aera dominate production that totaled nearly 22,000
barrels a day in March.
Measure Z would shut down Monterey's oil production, industry
officials said, by barring not just fracking but also new oil or
gas wells and by requiring companies to stop using wells and ponds
to dispose of water produced from underground as a drilling
byproduct.
"Measure Z bans oil production in the county because it does not
leave any way to manage the produced water," said Dallas Tubbs, a
Chevron engineer, speaking at the San Ardo field.
Aera referred inquiries to the opposition group it co-funds,
whose spokeswoman, Karen Hanretty, said the measure if passed would
likely be overturned in court.
The Monterey debate centers on how oil companies handle water
they pull up. Chevron recycles one-third of its water. That
process, called reverse osmosis, yields a liquid called brine
consisting of a high concentration of naturally occurring minerals
that must be disposed.
Measure Z's backers say drillers should be required to treat and
recycle all of it rather than inject it back underground. They
worry that water reinjected into the ground could contaminate the
area's drinking water.
"I'm not against fracking per se, I'm against contaminating the
water," said Ted Walter, 57, co-owner of Passionfish, a restaurant
in Pacific Grove along the coast, who has appeared in ads backing
Measure Z and calls the San Ardo oil fields "ugly."
Chevron's officials say they aren't sure it is technically
possible to recycle all the water byproduct, but that in any case
it is financially prohibitive. "We've been operating in this field
for 70 years," Chevron's Mr. Tubbs said. "We monitor the
groundwater monthly. The groundwater is as clean today as it was 70
years ago."
Regulators haven't found contamination related to reinjection in
Monterey -- something both Ms. Hanretty of the industry-funded
opposition group and Measure Z backers agree on.
Steve McIntyre, who owns roughly 12,000 vineyard acres in the
county, opposes Measure Z. A board member of the Big Sur Land
Trust, he said he is a registered independent, supports renewable
energy and is proud his vineyard has been certified
"sustainable."
He said he also supports the way the oil industry operates,
emphasizes America's dependence on oil and believes the
anti-fracking measure is a cover for a broad assault on fossil
fuels.
"Let's not be misleading here," said Mr. McIntyre, 59 years old.
"I believe they are using fracking as a hot button to get under
people's skin and get them excited."
The opponents group has aired ads showing a handsome veteran and
a chiseled rancher extolling local energy. Monterey's county
auditor in a report projected potential lost jobs of 730 if the
measure passes. Joe Gunter, mayor of Salinas, Steinbeck's hometown
in the county, is among local officials opposing the measure.
Supporters of Measure Z include Sen. Bernie Sanders, who spoke
at a rally supporting it, as did Dolores Huerta, a famed farm-labor
activist. Anti-fracking activists marched with a large puppet of a
condor in the Labor Day parade.
Measure Z proponent Andy Hsia-Coron, a 59-year-old retired
teacher living near Monterey Bay, at a recent taco fundraiser laid
out the arguments for the measure: climate change and clean
water.
"Oil is hindering the effort in terms of both moving toward
renewable energy and safe environmental practices," he said. Of the
water reinjection, he said, "eventually what they put down there
will find its way to other parts of the county."
Both sides have done internal polling, which they decline to
share. Many on both sides expect the vote to be close.
"If they win in Monterey, it sets a precedent," said Amy Myers
Jaffe, executive director for energy and sustainability at the
University of California, Davis. "It would show there's real
political force behind this movement."
Write to Amy Harder at amy.harder@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
November 03, 2016 10:38 ET (14:38 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2016 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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