From: brewnoser2@gmail.com   
      
   Takes steps to ban fracking by 2024 and will halt oil extraction by 2045   
      
   Executive order is a reversal for Governor Gavin Newsom, who faced pressure   
   from environmental groups for previously resisting a ban   
      
      
   California’s governor has moved to ban new fracking permits by 2024 and halt   
   all oil extraction by 2045.   
      
   California, the most populous US state, produces the third largest amount of   
   oil in the country. It would be the first state to end all extraction.   
      
   Gavin Newsom’s executive order, issued on Friday, paves the way for the   
   state to stop issuing new fracking permits within the next few years, giving   
   California’s Department of Conservation, which regulates the oil and gas   
   industry, until 2024 to    
   draft a mandate. The order also directs the California Air Resources Board to   
   evaluate how to enact a ban on all extraction over the next 25 years.   
      
   The agency will study the environmental and health benefits of ending oil   
   extraction, and determine how to mitigate the effect on local economies.   
      
   “The climate crisis is real, and we continue to see the signs every day,”   
   Newsom said in a statement. “I’ve made it clear I don’t see a role for   
   fracking in that future and, similarly, believe that California needs to move   
   beyond oil.”   
   'No one explained': fracking brings pollution, not wealth, to Navajo land   
   Read more   
      
   The order is a bold reversal for Newsom, who had initially resisted calls to   
   enact a narrower ban on new fracking permits, arguing he lacked the authority.   
   Fracking only accounts for about 1.5% of the state’s oil production. The   
   controversial    
   extraction method gets fuel out of the ground by using water and chemicals to   
   crack open geological formations and stimulate them to release gas or oil,   
   with the risk of causing earthquakes, water contamination and disastrous   
   spills.   
      
   Research has found that fracking and other types of extraction are dangerous   
   for the people who live near drilling sites – causing higher rates of asthma   
   and cancer, as well as preterm births.   
      
   “We’re very excited about this order,” Dan Ress, a staff attorney at The   
   Center on Race, Poverty, and the Environment told the Guardian. “This is a   
   big, bold step.”   
      
   Newsom’s announcement comes as he faces a likely recall election, and   
   pressure from environmental groups who in recent months questioned his   
   lukewarm support for broader legislation that would have banned fracking.   
      
   A bill that would have imposed tough restrictions on oil and gas failed to   
   attract the five votes it needed to pass through the California senate’s   
   natural resources committee last week. The legislation would have not only   
   banned new fracking permits    
   but also required a 2,500-foot buffer zone between drilling sites and schools,   
   playgrounds and residences.   
      
   Some 7.4 million Californians live within a mile of oil and gas drilling, with   
   low-income communities of color most affected.   
      
   “Communities need immediate relief to the heath assaults of oil and gas   
   extraction,” said Martha Dina Agruello, the executive director of the   
   Physicians for Social Responsibility.   
      
   To that end, environmental groups are now working with lawmakers to introduce   
   an amended version of the bill that focuses on instituting a buffer between   
   new and permitted drilling sites and where children live and play. Ress said   
   that advocates are also    
   asking the governor to issue an emergency rule mandating that filling sites   
   are at least 2,500ft away from communities.   
      
   Several other oil-producing states, including Texas, Wyoming, Louisiana,   
   Maryland, Illinois, Colorado and Pennsylvania have regulations on how close   
   sites can be to communities.   
      
   Oil and gas extraction in California has also come under increasing scrutiny   
   in recent years. Researchers say the state will need to double its efforts to   
   reduce greenhouse gas emissions as it finds itself in the throes of the   
   climate crisis, facing    
   worsening droughts, rising sea levels, historic wildfires and deadly heat   
   storms.   
      
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   Despite tighter constraints on the oil and gas industry that Newsom issued two   
   years ago, a lawsuit from the Center for Biological Diversity says California   
   Geologic Energy Management Division (CalGEM) has continued to approve drilling   
   permits without    
   proper environmental review. CalGEM issued the agency 213 permits for fracking   
   in 2019, and 82 in 2020, and it issued nearly 2,000 total permits for all new   
   oil and gas wells last year.   
      
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