The Brief

A new California law just signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom aims to close loopholes that have allowed oil drillers to walk away from wells that are no longer profitable but remain harmful. Oil majors have typically sold wells to smaller companies without paying to plug the wells, essentially sealing them off. Under the new law, buyers will have to put up a cleanup bond before regulators approve the sale.

But while the Orphan Well Prevention Act will help reduce the number of abandoned and orphaned wells — currently around 5,300 — industry watchers said it does little to address the looming issue of wells that remain dormant indefinitely, some of which leak climate-warming methane and toxic fumes.

About 38,800 wells in California are idle, meaning they’re unplugged but claimed by an operator; thousands more are barely producing and could be idled. Despite the health and climate risks, the state lets companies keep them that way.

For a few hundred dollars a year, the California Geologic Energy Management agency, or CalGEM, allows drillers to leave wells uncapped rather than paying to plug them. As they remain unplugged, the wells put low-income, mostly Latino communities at risk of air pollution, and any greenhouse gases the wells emit contribute to the climate crisis.

The agency reasons that companies might start producing oil from the wells again. But that doesn’t often happen, according to a report by Carbon Tracker Initiative, a London-based think tank. Thirty-nine percent of all wells in the state are idle; half haven’t produced oil in at least 15 years. More than 1,200 have been idle for longer than a century.

That was the case for wells that leaked in the southern San Joaquin Valley earlier this year. During an inspection in May, air quality inspectors from CalGEM, the California Air Resources Board and the San Joaquin Valley Air Pollution Control District discovered 27 leaking wells out of 68 inspected within a mile of Arvin and nearby Lamont.

Several leaked a combustible volume of methane, though agencies said the chance of an explosion was minimal. One was a few hundred feet from a high school’s outdoor field. Records indicated that the wells, many owned by Sunray Petroleum and Blackstone Oil and Gas Co., hadn’t produced oil in years. But for annual fees that ran between $150 and $1,500, companies were able to leave the wells unplugged.

The regulatory agencies, which examined the wells as part of the Methane Task Force, got the news out about the leaks via the internet.

Cesar Aguirre, the oil and gas director at the Central California Environmental Justice Network, said he and other organizers did their own outreach in person.

“We ended up running into people, especially closer to the wells, saying they felt lightheaded or smelled something,” Aguirre said. “They all shared symptoms typical when we do this kind of outreach, [such as] dizziness and headaches.”

CalGEM said the well and dozens of others were fixed three weeks later, but they remain unplugged.

In a statement, the agency said that all operators must test all their wells in idle status within six years of 2019, and repair or permanently seal them if they’re defective. It is also planning to plug and abandon 429 orphaned wells with federal and state funds.

Well cleanup costs in the billions

In recent weeks, the task force discovered more than a dozen leaking wells in nearby Shafter. It will present the findings in a meeting this month. Thousands of idle wells across the state are at risk of similar leaks.

Earlier this year, methane leaked from an idle well that also spewed petroleum onto crops and livestock at a farm in Bakersfield back in February. The operator of the well, Sequoia Exploration, Inc, paid $150 in 2022 to idle the well. (Farmer Larry Saldana is suing the company, arguing that its proposed remediation is insufficient.)

And last year Capital & Main reported on dozens of leaking wells in Los Angeles County, documented by the group FracTracker. Among them were at least five wells whose owners pay idle well fees.

Since 2019, CalGEM has collected $21 million from the idle well fee program, with about $4 million earmarked to plug and abandon. That amount is far less than the actual costs the state is likely to incur to permanently plug wells in the state.

There’s now a gap between the money needed to cap wells and the funds on hand to do so. It costs an average of $68,000 to plug a well; California only has about $1,000 each.

Carbon Tracker put the total well and associated infrastructure cleanup cost at $21.5 billion, a figure that will likely increase over the next two years as production revenue from oil fields declines. Companies have only put $106 million on the books, both through the idle well fee program and other bonding. Public funds to plug orphan wells currently stand at about $730 million.

By letting companies pay a small fee rather than forking up cash for remediation, the industry is putting the onus on taxpayers, according to Carbon Tracker. It also lets them avoid accounting for liabilities — old wells in need of costly plugging — on their balance sheets.

“It’s in their self-interest to pay the fee, but that means all that time their [still-producing] wells are generating revenue that is passed on to shareholders, instead of using that money toward this eventual liability they have to pay,” said Rob Schuwerk, executive director of Carbon Tracker’s North American office.

California’s lax approach to idle wells contrasts with that of other states, which impose firmer bonding rules on companies and guidelines on how long they can claim an idle well might produce oil again.

In North Dakota, the state requires companies to plug wells that haven’t produced oil or natural gas “in paying quantities” for one year, unless an extension is filed.

When BP decided to sell wells and other infrastructure in northern Alaska to private equity-backed Hilcorp — which one report ranked among the most polluting oil and gas companies in the U.S. — legislators said they won a legal guarantee from BP that it would remain liable for cleanup costs.

By contrast, when Exxon Mobil Corp. and Shell Oil Co. sold 23,000 California wells they operated in a joint venture called Aera Energy to German firm IKAV Asset Management this year, the state received no assurance that either company would help with any cleanup.

Aera Energy paid $2.26 million in idle well fees for 5,454 wells, according to state records. The majority haven’t produced any oil in the last five years, and 15 have been idle since before World War II.

CalGEM said it has a rule in place permitting it to pursue the assets of operators who owned wells after 1996 — the most prominent example being a $35 million collection from Exxon to abandon an offshore platform. But in “many instances,” past operators don’t have enough money to collect for cleanups, the agency said.

Climate impacts of idled wells unknown

The aging wells crisis will become more acute. California’s long term decline in oil production started in 1985 and accelerated in the 2010s. Upswings in the price of oil haven’t reversed the trend, Carbon Tracker said.

Yet regulators have continued approving permits for wells. This year, CalGEM issued 24 new well permits and nearly 2,000 for “reworks,” a type of permit issued to operators who want to repair aging wells.

Environmental justice and climate advocates have opposed each new approval as one too many. A working group convened by CalGEM found that toxins from wells in close residential proximity are “associated with adverse perinatal and respiratory outcomes.”

The climate risks of California’s idled wells are less well understood.

Last year, The Associated Press reported that the state wasn’t counting methane emissions from leaking wells in its greenhouse gas inventory. The state’s climate plan assumes oil field emissions will decline as Californians consume less oil, but does not account for unplugged and leaking wells.

Citing the passage of the Orphan Well Prevention Act, environmental groups demanded the state confront the broader costs of old wells.

“Lawmakers should build on this momentum and pass a bill that attacks the root of the problem by forcing the oil industry to clean up all its wells instead of pushing that burden onto California taxpayers or allowing wells to leak dangerous air pollution for decades,” said Kassie Siegel, director of the Center for Biological Diversity’s Climate Law Institute.

Carbon Tracker’s Schuwerk said that in the case of California, which faces an end game scenario for the oil industry, there are few incentives regulators can offer companies to clean up legacy wells.

In another report, Carbon Tracker recommended a severance tax on remaining oil output to prop up an insurance program to plug wells. Those funds could mitigate costs for both companies and the state.

“Who should bear the loss? Should it be the industry or taxpayers?” Schuwerk asked. “It’s mostly industry that has benefitted from the system, so my point is it should be them.”

The federal government has drastically scaled back the number of recommended childhood immunizations, sidelining six routine vaccines that have safeguarded millions from serious diseases, long-term disability and death.

Just three of the six immunizations the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says it will no longer routinely recommend — against hepatitis A, hepatitis B and rotavirus — have prevented nearly 2 million hospitalizations and more than 90,000 deaths in the past 30 years, according to the CDC's own publications.

Vaccines against the three diseases, as well as those against respiratory syncytial virus, meningococcal disease, flu, and COVID, are now recommended only for children at high risk of serious illness or after "shared clinical decision-making," or consultation between doctors and parents.

The CDC maintained its recommendations for 11 childhood vaccines: measles, mumps, and rubella; whooping cough, tetanus, and diphtheria; the bacterial disease known as Hib; pneumonia; polio; chickenpox; and human papillomavirus, or HPV.

Federal and private insurance will still cover vaccines for the diseases the CDC no longer recommends universally, according to a Department of Health and Human Services fact sheet; parents who want to vaccinate their children against those diseases will not have to pay out-of-pocket.

Experts on childhood disease were baffled by the change in guidance. HHS said the changes followed "a scientific review of the underlying science" and were in line with vaccination programs in other developed nations.

HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an anti-vaccine activist, pointed to Denmark as a model. But the schedules of most European countries are closer to the U.S. standard upended by the new guidance.

For example, Denmark, which does not vaccinate against rotavirus, registers around 1,200 infant and toddler rotavirus hospitalizations a year. That rate, in a country of 6 million, is about the same as it was in the United States before vaccination.

"They're OK with having 1,200 or 1,300 hospitalized kids, which is the tip of the iceberg in terms of childhood suffering," said Paul Offit, the director of the Vaccine Education Center at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and a co-inventor of a licensed rotavirus vaccine. "We weren't. They should be trying to emulate us, not the other way around."

Public health officials say the new guidance puts the onus on parents to research and understand each childhood vaccine and why it is important.

Here's a rundown of the diseases the sidelined vaccines prevent:

RSV. Respiratory syncytial virus is the most common cause of hospitalization for infants in the U.S.

The respiratory virus usually spreads in fall and winter and produces cold-like symptoms, though it can be deadly for young children, causing tens of thousands of hospitalizations and hundreds of deaths a year. According to the National Foundation for Infectious Diseases, roughly 80% of children younger than 2 who are hospitalized with RSV have no identifiable risk factors. Long-awaited vaccines against the disease were introduced in 2023.

Hepatitis A. Hepatitis A vaccination, which was phased in beginning in the late 1990s and recommended for all toddlers starting in 2006, has led to a more than 90% drop in the disease since 1996. The foodborne virus, which causes a wretched illness, continues to plague adults, particularly people who are homeless or who abuse drugs or alcohol, with a total of 1,648 cases and 85 deaths reported in 2023.

Hepatitis B. The disease causes liver cancer, cirrhosis, and other serious illnesses and is particularly dangerous when contracted by babies and young children. The hepatitis B virus is transmitted through blood and other bodily fluids, even in microscopic amounts, and can survive on surfaces for a week. From 1990 to 2019, vaccination resulted in a 99% decline in reported cases of acute hepatitis B among children and teens. Liver cancer among American children has also plummeted as a result of universal childhood vaccination. But the hepatitis B virus is still around, with 2,000-3,000 acute cases reported annually among unvaccinated adults. More than 17,000 chronic hepatitis B diagnoses were reported in 2023. The CDC estimates about half of people infected don't know they have it.

Rotavirus. Before routine administration of the current rotavirus vaccines began in 2006, about 70,000 young children were hospitalized and 50 died every year from the virus. It was known as "winter vomiting syndrome," said Sean O'Leary, a pediatrician at the University of Colorado. "It was a miserable disease that we hardly see anymore."

The virus is still common on surfaces that babies touch, however, and "if you lower immunization rates it will once again hospitalize children," Offit said.

Meningococcal vaccines. These have been required mainly for teenagers and college students, who are notably vulnerable to critical illness caused by the bacteria. About 600 to 1,000 cases of meningococcal disease are reported in the U.S. each year, but it kills more than 10% of those it sickens, and 1 in 5 survivors have permanent disabilities.

Flu and covid. The two respiratory viruses have each killed hundreds of children in recent years — though both tend to be much more severe in older adults. Flu is currently on the upswing in the United States, and last flu season the virus killed 289 children.

What is shared clinical decision-making?

Under the changes, decisions about vaccinating children against influenza, covid, rotavirus, meningococcal disease, and hepatitis A and B will now rely on what officials call "shared clinical decision-making," meaning families will have to consult with a health care provider to determine whether a vaccine is appropriate.

"It means a provider should have a conversation with the patient to lay out the risks and the benefits and make a decision for that individual person," said Lori Handy, a pediatric infectious disease specialist at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.

In the past, the CDC used that term only in reference to narrow circumstances, like whether a person in a monogamous relationship needed the HPV vaccine, which prevents a sexually transmitted infection and certain cancers.

The CDC's new approach doesn't line up with the science because of the proven protective benefit the vaccines have for the vast majority of the population, Handy said.

In their report justifying the changes, HHS officials Tracy Beth Høeg and Martin Kulldorff said the U.S. vaccination system requires more safety research and more parental choice. Eroding trust in public health caused in part by an overly large vaccine schedule had led more parents to shun vaccination against major threats like measles, they said.

The vaccines on the schedule that the CDC has altered were backed up by extensive safety research when they were evaluated and approved by the FDA.

"They're held to a safety standard higher than any other medical intervention that we have," Handy said. "The value of routine recommendations is that it really helps the public understand that this has been vetted upside down and backwards in every which way."

Eric Ball, a pediatrician in Orange County, Calif., said the change in guidance will cause more confusion among parents who think it means a vaccine's safety is in question.

"It is critical for public health that recommendations for vaccines are very clear and concise," Ball said. "Anything to muddy the water is just going to lead to more children getting sick."

Ball said that instead of focusing on a child's individual health needs, he often has to spend limited clinic time reassuring parents that vaccines are safe. A "shared clinical decision-making" status for a vaccine has no relationship to safety concerns, but parents may think it does.

HHS' changes do not affect state vaccination laws and therefore should allow prudent medical practitioners to carry on as before, said Richard Hughes IV, an attorney and a George Washington University lecturer who is leading litigation against Kennedy over vaccine changes.

"You could expect that any pediatrician is going to follow sound evidence and recommend that their patients be vaccinated," he said. The law protects providers who follow professional care guidelines, he said, and "RSV, meningococcal, and hepatitis remain serious health threats for children in this country."

This story comes from NPR's health reporting partnership with KFF Health News, a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues. KFF Health News is one of the core operating programs at KFF, the independent source for health policy research, polling, and journalism.

The National Park Service has updated its policy to discourage visitors from defacing a picture of President Donald Trump on this year's pass.

The use of an image of Trump on the 2026 pass — rather than the usual picture of nature — has sparked a backlash, sticker protests, and a lawsuit from a conservation group.

The $80 annual America the Beautiful pass gives visitors access to more than 2,000 federal recreation sites. Since 2004, the pass has typically showcased sweeping landscapes or iconic wildlife, selected through a public photo contest. Past winners have featured places like Arches National Park in Utah and images of bison roaming the plains.

Instead, of a picture of nature, this year's design shows side-by-side portraits of Presidents George Washington and Trump. The new design has drawn criticism from parkgoers and ignited a wave of "do-it-yourself" resistance.

Photos circulating online show that many national park cardholders have covered the image of Trump's face with stickers of wildlife, landscapes, and yellow smiley faces, while some have completely blocked out the whole card. The backlash has also inspired a growing sticker campaign.

Jenny McCarty, a longtime park volunteer and graphic designer, began selling custom stickers meant to fit directly over Trump's face — with 100% of proceeds going to conservation nonprofits.

"We made our first donation of $16,000 in December," McCarty said. "The power of community is incredible."

McCarty says the sticker movement is less about politics and more about preserving the neutrality of public lands. "The Interior's new guidance only shows they continue to disregard how strongly people feel about keeping politics out of national parks," she said.

The National Park Service card policy was updated this week to say that passes may no longer be valid if they've been "defaced or altered." The change, which was revealed in an internal email to National Park Service staff obtained by SFGATE, comes just as the sticker movement has gained traction across social media.

In a statement to NPR, the Interior Department said there was no new policy. Interagency passes have always been void if altered, as stated on the card itself. The agency said the recent update was meant to clarify that rule and help staff deal with confusion from visitors.

The Park Service has long said passes can be voided if the signature strip is altered, but the updated guidance now explicitly includes stickers or markings on the front of the card.

It will be left to the discretion of park service officials to determine whether a pass has been "defaced" or not. The update means park officials now have the leeway to reject a pass if a sticker leaves behind residue, even if the image underneath is intact.

In December, conservation group the Center for Biological Diversity filed a lawsuit in Washington, D.C., opposing the new pass design.

The group argues that the image violates a federal requirement that the annual America the Beautiful pass display a winning photograph from a national parks photo contest. The 2026 winning image was a picture of Glacier National Park.

"This is part of a larger pattern of Trump branding government materials with his name and image," Kierán Suckling, the executive director of the Center for Biological Diversity, told NPR. "But this kind of cartoonish authoritarianism won't fly in the United States."

The lawsuit asks a federal court to pull the current pass design and replace it with the original contest winner — the Glacier National Park image. It also seeks to block the government from featuring a president's face on future passes.

Not everyone sees a problem with the new design. Vince Vanata, the GOP chairman of Park County, Wyoming, told the Cowboy State Daily that Trump detractors should "suck it up" and accept the park passes, saying they are a fitting tribute to America's 250th birthday this July 4.

"The 250th anniversary of our country only comes once. This pass is showing the first president of the United States and the current president of the United States," Vanata said.

But for many longtime visitors, the backlash goes beyond design.

Erin Quinn Gery, who buys an annual pass each year, compared the image to "a mug shot slapped onto natural beauty."

She also likened the decision to self-glorification.

"It's akin to throwing yourself a parade or putting yourself on currency," she said. "Let someone else tell you you're great — or worth celebrating and commemorating."

When asked if she plans to remove her protest sticker, Gery replied: "I'll take the sticker off my pass after Trump takes his name off the Kennedy Center."

The 83rd annual Golden Globe Awards take place Sunday evening beginning at 5 p.m. at the Beverly Hilton Hotel, and that means parking restrictions and street closures in the city.

Here are places to avoid, as well as some alternative routes:

North Santa Monica Boulevard:

• Westbound lane closures: Complete lane closures, from Wilshire Boulevard to Century Park East through 6 a.m. Monday.
  
• Eastbound lane closures: Complete lane closures, from Century Park East to Wilshire Boulevard from 2 p.m. Saturday through 6 a.m. Monday. 

The city suggests using South Santa Monica Boulevard, which will remain open in both directions. There also are alternative east-west routes such as Olympic, Sunset and Pico boulevards.

Wilshire Boulevard:

• Eastbound/Westbound lane reduction: Lane reductions are in effect and will last through 9 p.m. Wednesday.
  
• Eastbound/Westbound full closure: All of Wilshire Boulevard between Comstock Avenue and North Santa Monica Boulevard will be closed from 10 p.m. Saturday through 6 a.m. Monday.
  
• Eastbound lanes of Wilshire Boulevard: An eastbound closure from Comstock to North Santa Monica Boulevard will occur between 10 p.m. Monday through 6 a.m. Tuesday.

Other streets:

Several other streets like Whittier Drive, Carmelita Avenue, Elevado Avenue and Lomitas Avenue, as well as Trenton Drive and adjacent alleys will have limited closures with local access available only to residents. Closures begin at 10 p.m. Saturday and last through 6 a.m. Monday.

Parking notices:

Residential streets surrounding the venue will be completely restricted, no exceptions made, from 6 a.m. Sunday until 6 a.m. Monday on the following streets:

• Whittier Drive — from Wilshire Boulevard to Elevado Avenue
• Carmelita Avenue — from Wilshire Boulevard to Walden Drive
• Elevado Avenue — from Wilshire Boulevard to Walden Drive
• Trenton Drive — from Whittier Drive to Wilshire Boulevard
• Walden Drive — from Santa Monica Boulevard to Elevado Avenue
• Lomitas Avenue — from Wilshire Boulevard to Walden Drive

Residents without permit parking can obtain parking exemptions by contacting the city of Beverly Hills’ parking exemption line at (310) 285-2548 or online at beverlyhills.org/parkingexemptions.

Demonstrations against this week’s deadly ICE shooting in Minneapolis are planned this weekend across Los Angeles. The protests are being organized by the “ICE Out For Good Coalition” — a network of several groups including the ACLU and 50501.

Here are a some of the planned actions across the city:

Saturday

• Pasadena: Noon to 2 p.m. at Garfield and Colorado Boulevard, across from the Paseo Mall
• Eagle Rock: 1 to 2 p.m. at Colorado and Eagle Rock boulevards
• City of Los Angeles: 2 to 4:30 p.m. in Pershing Square

Sunday

• West Hollywood: 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at 647 N. San Vicente Blvd., across from the Pacific Design Center.
• City of Los Angeles: Noon to 2 p.m. at The Home Depot on 2055 N. Figueroa St.
• Beverly Hills: 2 and 4 p.m. at 9439 Santa Monica Blvd., between Beverly and Canon drives