Platform Holly’s drilling operations were terminated nearly a decade ago, after an onslaught of spilled oil devastated the waters of the Santa Barbara Channel.
The rig died alongside marine life inundated with oil.
But what stayed alive was something else. Something unexpected for those who look at Holly and see a reaper of death.
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A reef: an artificial yet prolific marine ecosystem made possible by the 200-foot foundation of Holly.
What anchors down the once fossil fuel-sucking, habitat-destructing, oil-polluting platform is now the host of a wide array of aquatic flora and fauna.
“It’s a critical habitat that supports millions of pounds of marine life and millions of organisms,” said Chris Goldblatt, a marine ecosystem engineer who has been diving at rigs for 30 years.
Credit: Sheri Pemberton
Marine mammals flock to their safe haven on Platform Holly, for now.
“It’s not just attracting fish, it’s actually creating a net positive population.”
- Chris Goldblatt
Species of all kinds gravitate to the steel structure and its functional-for-life shape.
“It’s in lattice form, like the Eiffel Tower,” Goldblatt said. “The structure is incredibly attractive to the plankton to settle and grow.”
Platform Holly works for sea critters and crustaceans as a stable structural haven in the center of deep clear water. The reef thrives in the upper portion of the base, where light penetrates through the surface water.
“The top 45 feet is really like an intertidal, fully mature marine habitat with everything from mussels to a huge population of the California rock scallop,” Goldblatt said.
And it’s not only what lives on the reef, but what visits it.
“It’s a repository for these big animals,” said Goldblatt. “There’s calico bass and thousands of sea lions live near, on, or around it. The pelagic fish like yellowtail and white sea-bass can come in during the spawning season.”
Each depth and its varying conditions provide sanctuary for different batches of creatures. Further down the steel spire and into the darkness, a new swath of species flourish.
“As you go deeper, life thins out and you end up with a bunch of white sea anemones and rockfish,” Goldblatt said.
Holly has become a key habitat for rockfish populations, according to Goldblatt.
“UC Santa Barbara has shown that there’s actual reproduction that occurs,” Goldblatt said. “So you end up with more rockfish overall as a result of that rig being there.”
Life extends to the very ocean floor, where giant lobsters roam and mussels collect, forming piles that are homes for
bottom-dwellers.
“Basically the shells break off and make a big mound down there,” Goldblatt said. “There's a lot of animals that live in that mound.”
shell mounds
rockfish habitat
the reef
— 50 feet
— 200 feet
— 100 feet
— 150 feet
Holly's structure stretches 400 feet from the seafloor to the top of the drilling derrick
PLATFORM HOLLY
An entity connected to the cause of so much death now hosts an abundance of life — the irony is apparent. And it's created a controversy that tears environmentalists apart.
The formation of a reef has backtracked the assumption that ExxonMobil — the current owner of Holly — must remove the platform. ExxonMobil’s contract with the state includes
cradle-to-grave liability, meaning that the oil company must restore the area and mitigate environmental damages once the platform is decommissioned. And now it is.
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“All the original leases say the oil rig has to be returned to its natural state, which means full removal and scrape the shell mound off,” Goldblatt said.
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But doing so would kill off marine life and destroy the reef, which was not a consideration in the original deal. “You end up with this question of what do you do?” Goldblatt said.
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The fate of the life that formed and flourishes on the base of Holly now hangs in the balance of the state's decision to keep or kill the platform, and all that exists beneath it.
“Platforms are fully functioning vertical reefs that happen to be made of steel.”
- Milton Love
Platform Holly is one of many decommissioned rigs that has become a home to marine life.
RIGS
TO
REEFS
Sea life isn't picky. Animals gravitate to just about any underwater refuge, according to marine biologist Milton Love.
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“It's not a huge surprise that platforms are covered in sea life,” said Santa Barbara-based Love, who does research on aquatic biology below oil platforms.
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Rigs-to-Reefs is a program that repurposes these prolific offshore oil and gas platforms into artificial reefs. It takes advantage of the rigs that were installed for economic gains but have instead allured marine animals who embrace the abiotic structures as home.
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“If you put anything in the ocean, eventually something's going to go, 'Oh, I love this place,'” Love said, explaining that even a tire thrown in the water will generate life activity over time.
“They don't care what the hard stuff is: sewer pipes, rocks, platforms — to many species of fish, it's all the same.”
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The life that's attached itself to Holly might not possess the foundation of a natural reef, but its steel base has just about everything else, including a biodiverse ecosystem that promotes the creation of more life.
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“It's best if you think of any platform off California as just a great tall reef that happens to be made out of steel instead of rock,” Love said.
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Around the globe, offshore platforms are repurposed, often because their production slows and the cost of operation is no longer profitable.
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“Different things are done all over the world with platforms,” Love said. “There are thousands of platforms in the Gulf of Mexico, let alone the North Sea and Thailand and China and Nigeria and Australia."
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The Rigs-to-Reefs program has taken off in the Gulf of Mexico where Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas have all approved the conversion of rigs in the absence of natural reefs. To accommodate marine life, the platforms are either towed to a different location, toppled over and kept in place, or partially removed to make way for boat traffic.
TOPPLE IN PLACE
The platform is rested on its side on the ocean floor, where it can continue to provide sanctuary for marine life.
TOW AND PLACE
Once removing the above-water portion, the platform is towed to another underwater location that would benefit from introducing an artificial reef.
PARTIAL REMOVAL
The platform is cut halfway to make room for passing by ships and the top portion is placed beside the bottom.
But with naturally occurring reefs, California has never had a policy that permits platform repurposing.
No matter the circumstances, even if a rig was thriving with life, an oil company would dismantle the rig. In the 1990s, Chevron took four platforms out of the water from just south of Santa Barbara, each of which certainly hosted life.
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“They were just removed,” Love said. “There wasn't any pushback. There wasn't any thought.”
Until in 2010, when the state passed a law that allows for removing just part of a rig if it's proven to have a net benefit on marine life. The California Marine Resources Legacy Act requires that up to 80% of the funds saved by oil companies who no longer pay for removal must be funneled back into the state.
The law applies to a decommissioned Holly, which means that a once cut-and-dry process has become a contested issue.
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A no-questions-asked removal of the rig is “not going to happen this time,” Love said
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The State Lands Commission now has to make a decision: stick to protocol and blow Holly up, or consider another option that keeps it intact and pursues an unprecedented state Rigs-to Reef model.