If you think Monterey County's oil operations don't come with a great cost, think again.
In a report released today by the Center for Biological Diversity, which utilizes recent data from the California Air Resources Board, it is revealed that the process to extract oil from South County's San Ardo oilfield is more carbon-intensive than extracting oil from the Alberta tar sands, which have long been vilified as dangerously carbon-intensive source of fossil fuel.
Furthermore, the state's data shows that San Ardo's oil is the third-most carbon-intensive to process in California, but because the quantity of oil extracted in San Ardo dwarfs the first and second on that list, San Ardo is the most carbon-intensive oilfield in the state.
The report comes out just weeks before Monterey County residents will vote on Measure Z, which seeks to ban fracking, wastewater injection and new fossil fuel-related wells in the county.
"Allowing an expansion at the San Ardo oilfield," the report reads, "which already California's single-largest source of the most climate damaging oil, would directly contradict the state's crucial efforts to reduce pollution and avert the most dangerous effects of climate change."