Activists arrested after scaling state building in Porter Ranch gas leak protest

Two Bay Area residents scaled the entrance to the headquarters of the Califoia Public Utilities Commission today to protest the massive methane leak that dragged on for more than 100 days at Southe Califoia Gas Co.’s Aliso Canyon storage field above Porter Ranch.

The protestors have deployed a baer under the large state seal of Califoia on the front of the building.

Califoia Highway Patrol officers were at the San Francisco building removing the protesters.

Two of the protesters were arrested.

“We’re doing this in response to the lack of regulated natural gas facilities around the state, which were having serious impacts on community health — and they are also having an impact on the climate,” said a spokesperson for the San Francisco Bay Area chapter of Rising Tide North America.

The protest comes as U.S. Secretary of Energy Eest Moniz arrives in the San Feando Valley to tour the Aliso Canyon storage facility.

The leak was stopped last Thursday.

“While plugging the leak at Aliso Canyon has been a good step, today we are demanding that the PUC shut down all gas storage facilities; until they do, we are occupying the PUC,” Christy Teery-Spalding from Diablo Rising Tide, the San Francisco Bay Area chapter of Rising Tide North America, said in an email.

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