Los Angeles lawmakers are backing a state senate bill that would block new drilling at the Aliso Canyon SoCal gas facility that experienced a blowout more than a year ago. The utility company doesn't know what caused the blowout last year and until they do, LA County Supervisor Catherine Barger says she doesn't want to allow any new injections until SoCal Gas figures out how it happened.
"Until they really understand what caused it. I don't support them being allowed to do injections. There's no question in my mind that the community has suffered enough."
The facility near Porter Ranch discovered a gas leak in one of its 110 wells in October of 2015 that released more than 110,000 pounds of methane gas per hour. The blowout came from a storage facility located in an underground reservoir. Under order by the Los Angeles County of Health, several thousand residents had to be relocated while SoCal gas worked to plug the leak.
Utility workers were able to finally plug the leak on February 15th.