The Environment’s Advocate

In 1969, a major blowout at Union Oil’s Platform A caused an estimated four million gallons of crude to pour into the sensitive Santa Barbara Channel and onto the county’s prized beaches. It was the largest oil spill in United States waters at the time. 

The event, which today remains the largest oil spill in California’s history, prompted numerous pieces of environmental legislation in the intervening years. It was also a catalyst for the creation of one of California’s staunchest nonprofit environmental advocacy groups, the Environmental Defense Center (EDC). Providing free and low-cost legal services to other community groups, EDC remains the only nonprofit environmental law firm between Los Angeles and San Francisco, and has represented more than 130 nonprofit and community groups over the years.

In the Santa Barbara Channel, EDC has worked since 2007 to protect endangered species like blue, fin, and humpback whales from fatal ship strikes and to reduce air pollution. For nearly 40 years, it has collaborated with landowners and local and state agencies, serving as a vital community lifeline and watchdog to protect local creeks and rivers. And it has helped protect more than 100,000 acres of open space such as Ellwood Mesa, Carpinteria Bluffs, and the Douglas Family Preserve for public recreation, and critical habitat for species and wildlife.

But the nonprofit’s most pivotal work is its fight against the oil industry. For the past decade it has been working to secure a permanent ban on fracking and acidizing in the Santa Barbara Channel. A landmark achievement came in 2002, when it won a federal lawsuit before the 9th Circuit Court to extinguish 40 offshore leases, a first in America.

“When looking for EDC’s legacy, it’s really as much about what you don’t see,” says Executive Director Owen Bailey. “A short list would have to include the oil drilling, fracking, and acidizing that we have prevented, the industrial development that has not taken place, and the protected views and open spaces that will be here for people to enjoy forever.”

Today, EDC not only advocates to stop oil development, it is also actively supporting the transition to offshore renewable energy production that is properly sited to minimize impacts to coastal and marine environments. EDC’s expertise in this is critical as we need to both replace fossil fuel extraction and protect marine life and the Channel waters that do so much to define this beautiful place where we live.