For the more than 2 million people living within half a mile of toxic oil drilling in California — the vast majority of whom are low-income, Black, Brown, Indigenous, and immigrant — the road to a cleaner and healthier future away from toxic drilling has been long, windy, and with many starts and stops.
No matter what we look like or where we come from, we want our families to have the freedom to drink clean water, breathe clean air, and live in healthy communities. Frontline communities have been fighting for this healthy future for generations arguing that proximity to oil drilling greatly impacts human health. In the last decade, public health officials confirmed what communities had known from their lived experiences — neighborhood drilling is in fact linked to respiratory diseases, asthma, preterm births, and cancer. But for too long, fossil fuel CEOs and the politicians they pay for have spread lies about the possibility of change while polluting our neighborhoods and refusing to clean up their toxic mess.
Addressing this issue head on, in September 2022, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 1137 into law establishing setbacks — or a 3,200-foot buffer zone — between toxic oil drilling and where people live, work, and play. This victory came after two previously failed bills and an aborted public health regulation process. But thanks to a decade of campaigning by frontline communities, alongside Greenpeace USA and our supporters, a new official public health report, and elected officials finally willing to stand up to Big Oil, the law was finally signed.
Oil and gas companies proceeded to spend nearly $61 million over the last 18 months to not only pause the law but place a referendum on the 2024 ballot to reverse it. This anti-democratic move showed the industry’s blatant greed, placing oil profits over the health of millions of people.
But the majority of Californians who demand climate justice wouldn’t be stopped. In September 2023, climate organizations joined with the Empower California Voters Coalition, led by SEIU California State Council (a part of the Service Employees International Union to move legislators to enact common-sense reforms to the referendum process. These reforms meant clearer voting language at the ballot box so big corporations could no longer hijack our democracy and take advantage of a broken system.
Still, oil and gas companies were making the same old, tired arguments. But, teachers, home care and childcare workers, food and commercial workers, hospitality workers, nurses, doctors and more loudly proclaimed that ignoring the crisis of toxic oil and gas drilling in neighborhoods isn’t an option; and dozens of labor unions representing them signed on to “keep the law” to protect the health of millions at home and at work.
It was clear that oil and gas companies were in trouble, and had badly miscalculated their seemingly uncontrollable power and the ability of a diverse coalition of Californians to come together to fight back. Countless climate justice organizations; frontline communities; labor unions; public health officials; elected officials, including two California governors (Newsom and Schwarzenegger); celebrities and influencers, including actor and activist Jane Fonda; and many more found their way to collectively demand a better future.
And then it happened. On Wednesday, June 26, oil and gas companies surrendered, withdrawing their ballot referendum, immediately requiring the 3,200-foot health buffer zone between toxic drilling and where people live, work, and play to go into effect. This means that California will no longer approve permits to drill new oil wells or redrill existing wells within the buffer zone and existing wells must comply with pollution control and safety measures designed to reduce harm. With this victory, Californians showed that the many can defeat the money, and now meaningful health regulations will take effect.
While we must take time to celebrate this win, we stand ready for what’s to come. The oil and gas industry may have forfeited and run scared from this round of California vs Big Oil, but we know they will be back. Unfortunately for them, the emerging climate majority — all of you, alongside millions of concerned Californians, neighborhood activists, over 400 organizations, Governor Newsom, legislators, leaders, and philanthropists — are organized and supercharged to keep winning to secure climate justice and a livable future.
