The decommissioning of Platform Holly is back on again, after a pause — as in all aspects of life — for the pandemic. The State Lands Commission held a town hall meeting on Thursday evening, announcing that the DCOR crews were back on the platform, had completed plugging four of the 30 wells, and might be completely done in 12-18 months.
During the interval, as they near the end of the abandonment of the wells, the CEQA process would begin, said Peter Regan, the drilling expert with State Lands, and start asking the public to comment on what to do with the platform, somewhere around the middle of 2022.
State Lands is engaged in two other projects in connection with Holly: the Ellwood Onshore Facility and Piers 421 at Haskell's Beach . The wells at the onshore Piers 421 have been plugged, and the caissons and pier structures are next. Before State Lands can remove them, a CEQA document is needed, and the draft environmental report should be finalized for the piers early next year.