California’s Carbon Contradiction of Favoring Foreign Oil Over Domestic Truth

In the heart of California’s environmental policy discussions, a glaring contradiction casts a shadow over the state’s commitment to leading the world in climate action. California’s proposed Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS) regulatory package highlights the absurdity surrounding the carbon intensity evaluations of domestic versus imported crude oil. At the center of this controversy is the state evaluation that crude oil produced within California, under some of the most rigorous environmental, health, and labor regulations globally, is deemed more carbon-intensive than oil shipped across oceans from countries like Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Ecuador.

This discrepancy flies in the face of logic and highlights the inherent hypocrisy in the state’s approach to carbon accounting. It is profoundly frustrating to witness California’s environmental policies being purposely skewed by personal agendas over scientific models. How does the heavily regulated domestic oil production, where more than 25 local, state, and federal agencies oversee its operations, compare with oil from countries that don’t have to adhere to our laws and often engage in damaging environmental practices? 

How is oil from Ecuador, a country reported by the New York Times that is tearing down the rainforest in pursuit of oil extraction, considered less carbon-intensive? California’s “analysis” conveniently ignores the environmental cost of tearing down one of the most diverse ecosystems in the world and further compounds the irony by the fact that 50% of this oil is sold to California.

Iraq is the largest foreign oil importer to California and a leading country in gas flaring. The International Energy Agency reported that gas flaring “is a major source of CO2 emissions, methane, and black soot, and is damaging to health.”

Equally astonishing is the environmental and logistical gymnastics required to justify crude oil being imported on tanker ships from thousands of miles away, like Saudi Arabia, Kazakhstan, Brazil, Columbia, and Guyana, is less carbon intensive than California oil production that pipes the crude directly to the refineries. 

The methodological and data flaws in the OPGEE (Oil Production Greenhouse gas Emissions Estimator), which underpin these evaluations, reveal a troubling disregard for comprehensive environmental impact assessments. This model’s failure to accurately capture the carbon footprint of imported oil undermines California’s environmental leadership, jeopardizes the state’s climate goals, and wrongfully targets a key energy industry with 55,000 California employees. 

It’s frustrating to see policy decisions influenced by models detached from reality. These models must consider the stringent regulations that California’s domestic production must comply with including that all their greenhouse gas emissions are accounted for under the state’s cap and trade program. Imports are totally exempt from this program.

Penalizing California’s oil producers while inadvertently supporting environmentally detrimental practices abroad raises pressing questions about the objectives and integrity of the state’s environmental policies of the individuals behind his report. Are personal goals and agendas overshadowing the commitment to truth, science, and environmental stewardship?

Behind the (LCFS) regulatory package decision are the 55,000 men and women who work in our California oil industry. They all have families and are an integral part California’s economy and the communities they call home. They deserve honesty, accountability, and transparency. 

This state government’s decisions with our oil and energy industry must be guided by unbiased science, transparent methodologies, and a genuine commitment to the truth, not personal agendas.