Energy secretary orders Sable Offshore to restore California operations

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U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright ordered Texas-based Sable Offshore Corp. to restore oil and gas operations in waters off southern California that were damaged by a 2015 oil spill, invoking the Defense Production Act, according to a U.S. Department of Energy news release.

The directive, issued on Friday, targets Sable Offshore’s Santa Ynez unit and a pipeline system off Santa Barbara, DOE said. The department said the restart is intended to address supply disruption risks.

DOE said the Santa Ynez unit includes three rigs in federal waters, offshore and onshore pipelines, and the Las Flores Canyon Processing Facility. The facility can produce about 50,000 barrels of oil per day, and DOE said it would replace nearly 1.5 million barrels of foreign crude each month.

Wright said in a statement that the Trump administration remains committed to putting “all Americans and their energy security first.” He added that some state leaders had not followed similar principles, and he said the order would strengthen America’s oil supply while restoring a pipeline system described as vital to national security and defense.

Wright said the restoration would also help ensure West Coast military installations have the reliable energy he said is critical to military readiness.

The order comes after President Donald Trump signed an executive order early in his second term to reverse former President Joe Biden’s ban on future offshore oil drilling on the East and West coasts. A federal court later struck down Biden’s effort to withdraw 625 million acres of federal waters from oil development.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom condemned the restart directive, saying it attempts to illegally resume a pipeline activity that, in his account, is prohibited by court rulings and involves operators facing criminal charges. Newsom said California will not “stand by” while the Trump administration and Sable attempt to proceed, and he said state officials would seek to bring the parties “back in court.”

California’s challenge was already in motion. In January, the state sued the federal government over approvals for Sable Offshore’s plans to restart pipelines along the coast, with Democratic state Attorney General Rob Bonta arguing at the time that California oversees the pipelines through Santa Barbara and Kern counties and that the federal government had “no right to usurp California’s regulatory authority.”