Trump administration targets California coastal agency in escalation of energy production fight

The Trump administration plans to evaluate the performance of the California Coastal Commission, in the latest escalation of a dispute between the state’s Democratic leaders and the federal government over energy production.Per federal law, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa) is required to conduct reviews of federally approved coastal management programs, which take into consideration “the extent to which the State of California has implemented and enforced the program approved by the [commerce] Secretary”.In May, the US Department of Commerce posted a letter from its secretary, Howard Lutnick, where he called for the evaluation and accused California of “environmental terrorism”, saying the Golden state had obstructed spaceport developments.The US Department of Commerce did not immediately respond to a request for comment about which space-port proposals Lutnick was referencing.The California governor, Gavin Newsom, has not yet commented on the evaluation.Last August, the coastal commission declined to grant a US Space Force request to up the number of Space X rockets they could launch from a base on California’s central coast. Elon Musk’s aerospace company later sued the agency for political bias, a lawsuit that was settled in April.California has also been at odds with the Trump administration over oil production.Democrats in the Golden state have touted a commitment to renewable energy. The state aims to have a carbon neutral electrical grid by 2045.But, as gas prices skyrocket in the wake of the US-Israel war with Iran, the Trump administration has doubled down on domestic oil production, including in California.The administration invoked emergency powers to bring an oil operation back online. The pipeline has been shuttered for more than a decade, after it ruptured in 2015, sending over 140,000 gallons of crude oil into the ocean.The California attorney general, Rob Bonta, has sought to block the administration’s plan.“Let’s be clear: this illegal attempt from the Trump administration lets Sable profit at the expense of our environment and public health,” Bonta said in a May news release, adding that the federal government was interfering with the state’s “sovereign authority”.The state has also been embroiled in a legal dispute with the federal government over a nixed offshore wind project. California has a potential to generate clean energy from the strong consistent winds off its coast, with a goal to develop 25 gigawatts of offshore wind energy by 2045. The US Department of Transportation dealt a blow to those plans when it withdrew a nearly $427m Biden-era grant for the proposed plan to produce electricity for 25m homes.Last week, Bonta sent the Trump administration a notice of intent to sue.“California won’t stand idly by as the Trump Administration illegally strikes deals to kill offshore wind projects and replace them with more windfalls for his fossil fuel friends,” he said in a statement.