Donald Trump’s executive order could let California’s offshore oil firms abandon drills on seabed

Detailed summary

The potential overhaul would mark a major departure from how California has handled aging offshore oil platforms, all of which have been fully removed after being taken out of service.

Oil companies operating off California’s coast could soon be allowed to abandon offshore drilling structures on the ocean floor rather than spending hundreds of millions of dollars removing them.

The potential overhaul would mark a major departure from how California has handled aging platforms, all of which have been fully removed after being taken out of service.

The change stems from a little-noticed provision in a September executive order that primarily addressed recreational fishing.

President Trump used the directive to instruct the Department of the Interior to develop a federal program that would allow retired oil platforms to remain underwater and serve as artificial reefs.

A regulatory proposal scheduled for 2027 would establish a practice known as “toppling in place” as the standard approach to retiring offshore platforms.

Under that method, instead of dismantling the structures and hauling them away, crews would knock over all or most of a platform and leave it resting on the seabed.

Although the technique has been used in the Gulf of Mexico, it would be unprecedented in the Pacific waters off California.

The state currently has 23 oil platforms in federally controlled waters, including eight that are already in different phases of being retired. Another four are located in state waters.

The proposal could have enormous financial implications for the petroleum industry, which has benefited from several Trump administration policies aimed at expanding domestic oil production.

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