LOS ANGELES (AP) — The Latest on a $120 million court settlement from the nation’s largest-known natural gas leak (all times local):
11:55 a.m.
A judge has approved a $120 million court settlement from the nation’s largest-known natural gas leak.
Judge Carolyn Kuhl in Los Angeles Superior Court signed off Monday on a deal that environmentalists criticized as too favorable to Southern California Gas Co.
The settlement between SoCalGas and California and the city of Los Angeles calls for mitigating the massive amount of climate-changing methane that spewed for nearly four months from a 2015 blowout at the Aliso Canyon gas storage facility.
Environmentalist say a plan to capture methane from dairy manure gives the utility full credit for greenhouse gases they only pay partly to capture.
The state defended the deal as fair and says it’s not a subsidy to SoCalGas.
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9:09 p.m.
A stink is being raised over a $120 million court settlement from the nation’s largest-known natural gas leak. And it’s not about money, but cow manure.
Environmental groups have criticized a plan to put more than a fifth of the settlement for the leak from a storage facility just outside Los Angeles toward capturing climate-changing methane from dairy farms in California’s San Joaquin Valley.
In public comments filed with the state, groups have complained that Southern California Gas Co. is spending only a portion on the dairy projects and getting full credit for the amount of greenhouse gases they capture.
A Los Angeles judge is scheduled Monday to consider whether to approve the settlement.
The 2015 well blowout in the Aliso Canyon storage field that took nearly four months to stop.
