Four years after suing the California Resources Company over violations of the Clean Water Act in a coastal oil field north of the city of Ventura, last week the Environmental Defense Center again sued the oil company over a similar discharge violation from another large oil field in Ventura County, located on South Mountain, southeast of Santa Paula.
“In both these cases the company self-reported very high levels of pollutants, and in particular of Total Suspended Solids,” said Brian Segee, a senior attorney with the firm. “The cases are similar in some respects as both are very large oil fields administered by CRC. In both cases sediments can carry lots of other pollutants into local waterways. In both cases we alleged that the company had not done enough to control stormwater discharges.”
South Mountain is a 5,757-acre oil field to the south of Santa Paula, overlooking the town and the Santa Clara River. Though it has been producing oil since l916, it remains Ventura County’s second-most productive oil field, has nearly 300 working wells on its slopes, and produced 741,528 barrels of oil last year, according to reports maintained by the state Division of Oil, Gas, and Geothermal Resources.