As a former resident of Santa Barbara and retired Merchant Mariner, I’d like to comment on Mike Stoker’s November 25 op-ed “History Is Unfortunately About to Repeat Itself,” concerning the opposition to reopening Sable Oil’s offshore pipeline.
I worked on oil tankers. Their engines burn “bunker fuel” for power and locomotion. Bunker fuel is the utter end of the oil refining process. It is a viscous, horribly toxic goo, thick enough to walk upon until it is heated enough to liquefy and then burn in a ship’s engines.
Bunker fuel contains, among other contaminants, more than 5,000 times the sulphur that is in gasoline for cars. A single tanker burning bunker fuel produces pollution equivalent to 50 million automobiles. That is how awful the stuff is.
So, do you want the same as 150 million autos per day (three tankers) traversing through, and stopping to load up a cargo from an offshore storage and treatment facility in, the Santa Barbara Channel? Or does a pipeline to shore sound more reasonable? Think of what those ocean breezes could be carrying.
