Toxic Lobbying & PR
Valero funds lobbying and PR that threaten Benicians’ air and health.
With market value of $48 billion, Texas-based Valero Energy Corporation is a major member of the Western States Petroleum Association (WSPA), an oil industry association that has been described as “the most powerful corporate lobbying group in Sacramento.”
This is not to Benicia’s benefit. Many WSPA stances on crucial issues have potentially put Benicians’ and/or other Californians’ well-being at risk. Such stances include:
In 2015, the WSPA undertook a multi-million dollar public relations campaign to block the passage of SB 350, the California legislation that aims to “increase California’s share of electricity from renewable sources to 50%, increase building energy efficiency 50%, and cut California’s use of oil in half through programs that enable a combination of new technologies, vehicle efficiency, and better planning.” Despite the Association’s extensive efforts, the Clean Energy and Pollution Reduction Act of 2015 ultimately passed.
Last year, the WSPA unsuccessfully fought against the Bay Area Air Quality Monitoring District adopting anti-pollution measures that could well save lives and health care costs in the area. “The board voted to require refineries to install technology that would slash particulate output from the units by 70%, according to the air district. It is a technology that is already widely in use, even in oil-friendly states like Texas.” The WSPA took this position despite District estimates “that exposure to particulate matter from the Chevron refinery in Richmond increases mortality in the region by up to 10 deaths per year, while the PBF Energy refinery in Martinez adds up to six deaths per year . . . ” and that the “proposed changes to the Chevron plant alone could result in up to $27 million in health cost savings to those living nearby…”
This year, WSPA is fighting to prevent the passage of legislation that, along with other health and safety measures, would mandate a ban on new oil drilling within a “3,200-foot health and safety buffer zone between new and reworked oil and gas wells and sensitive land uses, including schools, childcare centers, community resource centers, residential homes and live-in housing, and hospitals…”. The Association opposed this change despite the fact that “California is still one of two oil and gas producing states — the other is Alaska — that doesn’t mandate health and safety setbacks around homes, schools, child care centers, hospitals and other facilities.” Even oil-producing Texas, Valero’s home state, requires such setbacks.
These are but a few examples of environmental, health and safety initiatives that Valero has opposed through the lobbying and PR work of the WSPA.
With positions such as this on the state level, what might the “Working Families” PAC, and by extension Valero, be seeking to do if it successfully influences our City Council election?