(A) It is the purpose of this chapter, among other things, to protect the health, safety, public welfare, physical environment and natural resources of the county by the reasonable regulation of petroleum facilities and operations, including but not limited to: exploration; production; storage; processing; transportation; disposal; plugging and abandonment of wells; and of operations and equipment accessory and incidental thereto.
(B) It is further the intent of the County Board of Supervisors that petroleum operations shall be permitted within this county (except where expressly prohibited herein), through a conditional use process further described in this chapter and in Title 25 (Zoning) of the San Benito County Code, subject to all applicable laws, regulations and requirements.
(C) It is the purpose of this chapter to protect and balance the interests of the simple fee interest (commonly called surface owner) and mineral encumbered fee simple interests (commonly called mineral owners) in gaining access to and making use of the natural resources of San Benito County’s oil and gas reserves with the concerns of potential risk to the health and safety of the people of San Benito County. It is also the goal of this chapter to protect the water, natural resources, wildlife, and air quality of our county, to permit and supervise the extraction of oil and gas while recognizing that San Benito County is also the home of other unique natural resources, and to protect these resources for future generations while contributing to and acknowledging our dependence on and need for oil and gas and to maintain and enhance our lifestyles.
(D) It is not the intent of this chapter to regulate public utility operations for the storage or distribution of natural gas. Any drilling, therein, however, shall be subject to this chapter.
(E) All amendments to this code shall be applied in a prospective manner only, not retrospectively to situations, conditions or facts existing at the time of or prior to the amendment. Further, this chapter shall only apply to those applications deemed complete after the effective date of this chapter.
(F) The regulations contained within this chapter shall apply to equipment, structures, and appurtenances necessary for: the drilling of a new well, facilities for the production of oil and gas from a well; reentering a previously abandoned well for the production of oil and gas; structures, equipment, or facilities necessary and incidental to the separation of oil, gas, and water (e.g., oil and gas separation plant); injection wells and incidental equipment necessary for enhanced oil recovery or disposal of production wastes including but not limited to the equipment and facilities necessary for waterflooding, steam injection, air injection, natural gas, carbon dioxide injection, or introduction of polymers or other agents; pipelines that are incidental to production operations; storage tanks necessary or incidental to oil and gas separation, or temporary storage of separated hydrocarbons, and equipment for transfer of the produced hydrocarbons to pipelines or tanker trucks; proposed access roads; oil spill containment and recovery equipment including but not limited to central office space and vehicles for the storage of floating air/water separators, pumps, generators, hosing, assorted absorbent materials, steam cleaners, storage tanks, and other land and wildlife cleanup equipment; co-located treatment and processing facilities located on the drill site determined by the Planning Commission to be incidental to proposed production operations; and hydraulic fracturing, or use of any secondary or enhanced recovery methods of any new or existing well.
(Ord. 918, § 1(part), 2013)