For The Archives: California's Dependency On Domestic Oil And Gas Industry -- September 2, 2015

For the archives. The Breitbart article has to do with fracking and California's drought. It's really a two-piece article. The first half of the article is on the Monterey Shale formation; the second half is one California's dependency on oil.

I linked this article earlier with the emphasis on Monterey Shale. This time, the stand-alone post has do with California's dependency on the oil and gas industry. If I was unaware of this, I assume most Californians were unaware of it, and certainly all of those "Jaywalkers" on Jay Leno's late night show are unaware of it.

Some very interesting data points:

The Sacramento Bee reported that up to half of the hundreds of new wells drilled each year in the San Joaquin Valley are being “fracked,” according to a study required by the 2013 law regulating the practice. [By the way, note the spelling of "fracked" by the Sacramento Bee.]

Zack Malitz of the environmental group Credo complained to Reuters: “Governor Brown is forcing ordinary Californians to shoulder the burden of the drought by cutting their personal water use while giving the oil industry a continuing license to break the law and poison our water.”

He added, “Fracking and toxic injection wells may not be the largest uses of water in California, but they are undoubtedly some of the stupidest.”

Gov. Brown has tried to sound high-minded about water use, but the real issue is that California’s State Budget is highly reliant on the oil industry revenues. 

The blog CalWatchdog.com calculated that the oil and gas industry contributed $21.55 billion to the state’s public fiscus. That amounts to over twice the salary compensation for state employees last year. If Brown cuts oil industry water, he will have to fire state workers.

Still, crude oil production in California has fallen for 27 of the last 30 years, from about 1.15 million to 566,000 barrels per day. California used to be self-sufficient, but now imports 62.8 percent of the petroleum it uses.

Last year, California spent about $32 billion to import 400 million oil barrels of oil.

The oil and gas industry contributes over $20 billion to the state coffers. You know that intermittent energy (wind, solar) takes money away from state coffers through tax breaks, subsidies, and grants.