SANTA BARBARA COUNTY, Calif. (KEYT) – On Friday, Judge Donna Geck upheld an injunction imposed in July of last year preventing the restart of onshore pipelines despite the intervention of federal regulators.
"After considering all of the arguments, facts, and circumstances presented in Sable's motion for reconsideration, the court does not find the evidence of subsequent events involving PHMSA [the U.S. Department of Transportation's Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration] and federal appellate proceedings are sufficient to reconsider its ruling on the preliminary injunction or to modify or dissolve the preliminary injunction," wrote Judge Donna Geck in a tentative ruling issued Thursday. "The motion will therefore be denied."
Under the injunction, Sable Offshore, the company working to restart oil production locally since purchasing oil production infrastructure from ExxonMobil in February of 2024, must notify the court and plaintiffs when it receives all the approvals necessary to restart the use of onshore pipelines at least ten court days before starting.
That court-ordered window ensures that the Houston-based energy company would be subject to lawsuits from interested parties even after fulfilling all the needed approvals for a restart.
"The court had excellent reasons for granting this injunction in the first place, and I’m relieved that we’ll still have that safeguard," said Julie Teel Simmonds, Senior Counsel at the Center for Biological Diversity, one of the plaintiff's in Friday's proceedings. "This oil pipeline has such a checkered history that it shouldn’t be restarted without the utmost scrutiny. If Sable says a restart is coming, we’ll absolutely use the 10 days required by the injunction to make sure all laws have been followed to keep wildlife and the coast safe."
Oversight of any plans to restart onshore pipelines needed to transport oil from the Las Flores Canyon Facility on the Gaviota Coast, which receives and processes oil from offshore platforms, has been assigned to the Office of State Fire Marshal since the Refugio Oil Spill of 2015.
"Ever since a catastrophic oil spill at Refugio Beach in 2015 led to a court-ordered consent decree, CAL FIRE - Office of the State Fire Marshal has been responsible for overseeing the repair of the lines that caused the spill, which are now operated by Sable Offshore Corp in Santa Barbara County," shared Daniel Villaseñor with the California Natural Resources Agency.
The pipeline that ruptured back in 2015, formerly known as Line 901 and now known as Line CA-324, has remained dormant since it ruptured in May of 2015, spilling an estimated 450,000 gallons of crude oil over 150 miles of California coastline and destroying thousands of acres of shoreline habitats.
"While Sable now argues that it is not a party to the proceedings in which the Federal Consent Decree was entered, Sable's authority to operate the Las Flores Pipelines derives from rights obtained by [former owner of the pipelines] Plains [All American Pipeline], for which Plains was, and remains, subject to conditions including conditions set forth in the Federal Consent Decree. Sable has not demonstrated any right to operate the Las Flores Pipelines separate from the rights derived from Plains and subject to the Federal Consent Decree," explained Judge Geck on Friday. "[T]he Las Flores Pipelines may not be restarted without obtaining a State Waiver from the OSFM [Office of State Fire Marshal]."
In September of last year, Sable Offshore submitted a Request for Approval of Restart Plans which involved the onshore pipelines to the California Office of State Fire Marshal in accordance with the consent decree agreed to by the previous owner of the pipelines.
The state safety regulator found that there were still outstanding steps required before approving restart the following month.
In response, Sable Offshore informed investors in December of last year that it had determined that pipelines connecting an onshore oil processing plant on the Gaviota Coast to Pentland Station in Kern County are technically interstate pipelines under the Pipeline Safety Act and requested that federal regulators take over its restart plans involving the pipelines.
The Department of Transportation agreed with Sable Offshore's assessment and promptly asserted its authority over restart plans in mid-December.
The Department of Transportation's pipeline safety regulator argued that the restart plans were subject to emergency permitting based on a national energy emergency declared by President Trump last year which could bypass normal regulatory steps.
"Sable stated that expedited review of its application was warranted in light of the national energy emergency declared by the President under the National Emergencies Act in Executive Order 14156," announced the Department of Transportation when issuing the emergency permits to Sable Offshore. "This emergency special permit allows Sable to operate Lines CA-324 and CA-325 without being subject to the requirement to evaluate and remediate corrosion of or along a longitudinal seam weld within 180 days."
According to an 8-K filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, the U.S. Department of Transportation Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration informed the Houston-based energy company that it had approved its restart plans for Line CA-324 and Line CA-325 on Dec. 22, 2025.
Days after the approval, environmental advocacy groups filed an emergency lawsuit seeking to block the approval, but the federal court declined to issue a stay on federal approval of restart plans.
Despite the decision to not immediately halt the restart process, the court did grant that the lawsuit would receive expedited processing and, during court proceedings in early January, legal representatives of Sable Offshore admitted that oil production had not restarted at both offshore and onshore pipelines, opening the onshore pipelines up to a recently passed state law.
The new state law, SB 237, would require Sable Offshore to request a coastal development permit among other steps from the California Coastal Commission to conduct any, "Repair, reactivation, and maintenance of an oil and gas facility, including an oil pipeline, that has been idled, inactive, or out of service for five years or more".
Those specifications only apply to shuttered onshore pipelines in Santa Barbara and Kern counties.
On Monday, federal pipeline safety regulators announced a 30-day public comment period that opened the following day regarding a special permit for Sable Offshore approving its plans to restart the dormant pipelines.
During the flurry of approvals and litigation in late December of last year, the California Coastal Commission noted that it had not waived its right under the Coastal Zone Management Act to review the federal regulator's decision to reclassify pipelines and assume authority over restart plans.
The state regulator added that the federal government's expedited approval is also subject to review of compliance under Subpart E of the Coastal Zone Management Act, through the National Environmental Policy Act, as well as through Appendix D of the Consent Decree in U.S. et al v. Plains All American Pipeline, LP and Plains Pipeline, a court decision agreed to after the 2015 Refugio Oil Spill.
The Coastal Commission's insistence on a 30-day review period joins other state agencies noting that the restart process still has outstanding steps here in California.
According to California State Parks, an easement for Gaviota State Park is also necessary to restart production and has not been granted for CA-325 which runs through the state agency's jurisdiction.
In addition to those remaining regulatory hurdles barring a restart, Sable is also facing civil charges brought by the California Attorney General and criminal charges brought by the Santa Barbara County District Attorney's Office regarding its pipeline repair work.
"The allegations from the Santa Barbara County District Attorney’s Office are inflammatory and extremely misleading," stated a spokesperson on behalf of Sable Offshore. "All of the repairs and excavations were supervised by a certified independent biologist and cultural resource professional and Office of State Fire Marshal personnel. No wildlife were adversely affected. All of these previously disturbed areas have been or are being remediated in accordance with state and local erosion control mitigation measures."
Further complicating Sable's restart plans was the decision by the County of Santa Barbara's Board of Supervisors to not transfer permits the day before the Department of Transportation publicly shared that it had taken over oversight of the restart process from state safety regulators.
"Not only does Sable still need approvals from the State Fire Marshal, but it has failed to get other necessary approvals including an easement to operate through Gaviota State Park and a new Coastal Development Permit from the California Coastal Commission," detailed Chief Counsel for the Environmental Defense Center Linda Krop Friday. "Restarting this system without making critical repairs, without required approvals, and with no environmental review or public vetting at any level of government is not just illegal—it’s a danger to the coast and everyone living nearby."
Despite those attempts to supplant state regulators with federal ones, arguments heard in federal court that offshore and onshore pipelines are inherently connected and already active, and Friday's court hearing in Santa Barbara, Sable Offshore still has its alternative plan to completely remove state authority by shipping crude oil directly from offshore platforms.
On Oct. 9 of last year, Sable submitted an updated Development and Production Plan to the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, a key regulatory hurdle to begin shipping crude oil from offshore oil platforms in the Pacific Outer Continental Shelf Area.
"Continued delays related to the Santa Ynez Pipeline System have prompted Sable to evaluate and pursue the OS&T [Offshore Storage and Treating] Strategy," stated Sable Offshore in an 8K filing last year. "In connection with implementation of the OS&T Strategy, the Company expects to opportunistically acquire an existing OS&T in the first quarter of 2026, with delivery of the vessel to SYU expected in the third quarter of 2026."
The decision to ship crude oil from an offshore tender in federal waters to an out-of-state or even international destination would bypass the authority of the Office of State Fire Marshal confirmed the state-based emergency response agency in October of last year.
Sable's interest in getting oil to market isn't just tied to a return on those investments with it's investors, Sable's purchase of the entire oil-generating infrastructure from ExxonMobil back in February of 2024, has a crucial deadline.
Court documents revealed that Sable secured a $622,000,000 loan from Exxon to fund the purchase of the local oil production infrastructure which has a stipulated deadline where ownership would revert back to ExxonMobil unless oil from the Santa Ynez Unit under Sable's management enters the market.
On Nov. 3, 2025, Sable was able to extend that maturation deadline to March 31, 2027, the extension also included an increased interest rate from ten percent to 15 percent per annum, and requires the Houston-based energy company to retain no less than $25 million in unrestricted cash each month.
Your News Channel reached out to Sable Offshore and its representatives about Friday's decision, as well as specific questions about the offshore shipping plan and other ongoing litigation and its response will be added to this article when it is received.
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