Safely closing all orphan, idle, and marginal wells in California will create more than 22,000 jobs over a five-year just transition period. A just transition will employ workers in an industry that is currently shedding jobs, and will help build the clean energy economy of tomorrow by reducing pollution and expanding opportunity for all.

As oil companies fail, taxpayers could be left holding the bill. It will cost nearly $21.5 billion to clean up California’s onshore oil and gas wells that are inactive (“idle”) and soon-to-be inactive (“marginal”), according to the report “There will be blood” published by Carbon Tracker. Yet, oil companies have given the state less than $106 million for clean up.

California Resources Corporation (CRC), California’s largest oil and gas producer with 18,000 wells, filed for bankruptcy on in July 2020. The company has outstanding liabilities of a nearly one billion dollars in well-closure costs and obligations, $5.2 billion in unpaid loans, and pension and health care
obligations.

Air pollution from fossil fuel production and burning already kills 34,000 Californians and costs $100 billion dollars per year. People living near oil and gas sites suffer higher rates of cancer, asthma, hospitalization, respiratory harms, and rashes, birth defects, premature births and high-risk pregnancies, and underweight babies.

Idle wells can leak air pollutants or allow toxic substances to migrate into groundwater or flow up to the surface. The risk increases the longer wells are left unattended.

Harms from oil and gas pollution disproportionately impact people of color and economically disadvantaged communities. Idle wells can emit toxic air pollution if not properly closed. Approximately 58% of idle wells are located in communities with above-average poverty rates and communities of color.

Air pollution is a major contributor to COVID-19 deaths, a primary factor in Black and Latino Americans being more than twice as likely to die from COVID-19.