Overview
- On Jan. 23, Attorney General Rob Bonta and the State Fire Marshal asked the Ninth Circuit to vacate PHMSA orders they call arbitrary and capricious.
- The challenge targets PHMSA’s Dec. 17 reclassification of two onshore lines (CA-324 and CA-325) as interstate and its Dec. 22 approval of Sable Offshore’s restart plan and emergency permit under the president’s energy order.
- California argues the pipelines run entirely in-state from Santa Barbara County to Kern County under a consent decree that assigns the State Fire Marshal a formal role in any restart.
- PHMSA defends the move as restoring longstanding federal jurisdiction and says restarting Las Flores will provide “much needed American energy” to a high‑price market.
- Sable, seeking to resume offshore production after a 2015 rupture spilled about 140,000 gallons of oil, faces an $18 million state fine and criminal charges it disputes, and the case now puts pipeline oversight before the court.