石油价格

洛杉矶一名法官本周拒绝推翻该县七年前管道破裂后禁止埃克森美孚使用油罐车将原油从海上平台运至炼油厂的决定。

资料来源：路透社

该管道位于圣巴巴拉附近，于 2015 年破裂，造成大量泄漏，随后暂停。然而，由于当地对所有管道的强烈反对，该问题也没有得到解决，因此埃克森美孚试图转向油罐车作为将原油从生产地运输到加工地的替代方式。

然而，2022 年初，圣巴巴拉县监事会以有证据表明油罐车存在危险为由，拒绝了这家超级巨头的货运许可证。

据路透社报道，现在，多莉·吉法官维持了监事会的决定，称埃克森美孚没有使用油罐车运输石油的既定或基本权利 。

埃克森美孚表示，使用油罐车的权利对于重新启动在泄漏事件后关闭的三个海上平台和一个陆上加工设施至关重要。这三个平台每天生产约 30,000 桶原油。

该公司还辩称，圣巴巴拉监事会的决定代表了对埃克森公司财产的违宪征用。该主张以及其他与宪法相关的主张将由法院稍后审理。

环保组织对法官对油罐车的裁决表示欢迎。

与此同时，今年早些时候，圣巴巴拉规划委员会 剥夺了 负责 2015 年破裂的 901 管道的太平洋管道公司升级基础设施的权利，尽管此次升级并不是使其重新投入运营的准备行动。

埃克森美孚附属公司太平洋管道公司表示，需要根据州政府关于在管道中安装现有最佳技术的要求更换管道上的阀门。然而，由于当地反管道抗议活动增多，该委员会否认了该计划。

查尔斯·肯尼迪 (Charles Kennedy) 为 Oilprice.com 撰写

Oil Price

A Los Angeles judge this week refused to overturn a county’s decision prohibiting Exxon from using tanker trucks to move crude oil from offshore platforms to refineries after the rupture of a pipeline seven years ago.

Source: Reuters

The pipeline, near Santa Barbara, ruptured in 2015, causing a substantial spill, after which it was suspended. However, it has not been fixed, either, due to strong local opposition to all pipelines, so Exxon tried to turn to tanker trucks as an alternative means of transporting crude oil from the place of production to the place of processing.

Yet in early 2022 the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors denied the supermajor a trucking permit, citing evidence that tanker trucks are dangerous.

Now, Judge Dolly Gee has upheld the decision of the board of supervisors, saying Exxon had no vested or fundamental right to use tanker trucks for transporting its oil, Reuters reported.

Exxon has stated that the right to use tanker trucks was essential for restarting three offshore platforms and an onshore processing facility that was shut down after the spill. The three platforms produced some 30,000 barrels of crude daily.

The company has also argued that the Santa Barbara Board of Supervisors’ decision represented an unconstitutional taking of Exxon’s property. That claim and others related to the constitution will be looked into by the court later.

Environmentalist organizations welcomed the judge’s ruling on the tanker trucks.

Meanwhile, earlier this year, the Santa Barbara Planning Commission denied Pacific Pipeline Corporation, in charge of the Pipeline 901 which ruptured in 2015, the right to upgrade the infrastructure, even though the upgrade was not a preparatory move for putting it back into operation.

Pacific Pipeline Corporation, an Exxon affiliate, stated it needed to replace valves on the pipeline in line with state mandates for installing the best technology available in pipelines. However, the commission denied the plan amid more local anti-pipeline protests.

By Charles Kennedy for Oilprice.com