ORANGE COVE, Calif. – A growing number of Orange Cove residents are speaking out after they say they were volunteered for a controversial clean-energy trial without their consent.
More than 650 of them — nearly 20% of the electorate — signed a petition presented to the city council April 22 that voiced their opposition to the city’s participation in a short-term hydrogen blending project planned by the Southern California Gas Co.
During public comment at the council meeting, several members of the citizen’s group Orange Cove United urged city leaders to hear their concerns regarding the potentially detrimental health and safety impacts associated with a demonstration project that would change the chemical composition of the natural gas piped to the stoves, furnaces and water heaters in their homes.
“I’m asking you to withdraw your support, please,” Orange Cove resident Estela Juarez implored council members during the meeting. “Please listen to us.”
“They're making decisions without our opinions,” resident Alma Figueroa said in a subsequent interview. “I don't want to be an experiment. … They said it’s a project. But if it’s something that is not being done anywhere else, to me it’s an experiment.”
In 2022 SoCalGas, along with three other of the state’s investor-owned utility companies, petitioned the California Public Utilities Commission to begin blending hydrogen with natural gas into the existing gas infrastructure of select municipalities as a way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Because hydrogen releases only water and heat when burned, it is considered a “clean” fuel. That’s opposed to natural gas, which is primarily made up of methane, a hydrocarbon that contributes to climate pollution by emitting carbon dioxide when burned.
In February 2024, SoCalGas announced it had chosen the isolated farm town of Orange Cove in eastern Fresno County as the site for one of its demonstration projects. One month later, without informing residents, the city council unanimously passed a resolution directing city staff to work with the utility company on its development.
Plans call for SoCalGas to construct a hydrogen blending facility on an open parcel of land adjacent to the Orange Cove High School football field for the purpose of injecting natural gas with up to 5% hydrogen gas and delivering it to the city’s utility customers. The $85 million project would be funded by ratepayers. At the conclusion of the 18-month trial, the city would return to 100% natural gas.
Final approval by the state public utilities commission on whether to move forward with the pilot project, along with similar hydrogen blending test proposals in Lodi, Truckee, Irvine and San Diego, is expected in June.
“These demonstration projects are an important step for us to adopt hydrogen blending projects statewide, which has the potential to be an effective way to reduce hydrocarbons,” Neil Navin, the chief clean fuels officer for SoCalGas, said in a March statement.
Hydrogen blending already occurring
Hydrogen blending is not a new concept. Mixing hydrogen with natural gas — up to 20% hydrogen in some places — is already occurring or being tested in roughly a dozen states and several foreign countries.
However, despite both observed and theoretical benefits, the practice has not been universally hailed as a climate change solution due to several potential drawbacks.
For residential gas consumers, the most worrisome are needless threats to health and safety while at home in their supposed safe space. Researchers at the University of York in Great Britain, where hydrogen blending has been in use since the 2010s, have shown that hydrogen-blended natural gas can increase methane emissions that can exacerbate asthma and have also been linked to other respiratory illnesses — especially when used in older appliances.
Orange Cove is made up of mostly of Spanish-speaking Latino immigrants. Nearly 40% of the city’s 10,000 residents live in poverty, according to census figures.
Billy Dahl, who has lived here for 28 years, said Orange Cove’s gas infrastructure dates to the late 1940s and 50s and that most homes have decades-old appliances that were not designed for hydrogen, even in a diluted form.
“Hydrogen will find the weakest point of any joint,” Dahl said. “How safe is it going to be should it bust the pipes in my house?”
As an assurance to residents, SoCalGas has pledged to employ a number of safety measures before, during and after the project. These include leak surveys and detection as well as the use of back-flow technology that ensures hydrogen remains within a controlled area.
However, some say those steps fall short of what’s needed.
Juarez, who helped circulate the Orange Cove United petition by going door-to-door, said she asked company representatives and city officials for a written liability waiver after learning that her home insurance and appliance warranties didn’t cover hydrogen blending.
“Who’s responsible? SoCalGas? The city of Orange Cove? Who’s responsible?” Juarez asked. “Where is there anything on paper that says we (have) something that protects ourselves? There’s nothing.”
Members of Orange Cove United are being advised and assisted by San Joaquin Valley-based environmental justice groups including Leadership Counsel for Justice and Accountability.
Jamie Zweitler-Katz, a senior attorney with the organization, pointed out that residents have no choice but to participate in the hydrogen-blending project — even against their wishes — unless they make the costly decision to replace each of their gas appliances with electric.
“Without additional support, that’s a very expensive process,” Zweitler-Katz said. “There’s no proposal here to help residents electrify. And there’s no additional programs to help residents get newer appliances.”
Residents say they weren’t consulted
Besides health and safety concerns, Orange Cove residents are upset city leaders made the deal with SoCalGas behind their backs and before their views could be heard.
City officials aren’t saying much. Multiple council members and city manager Samuel Escobar did not respond to messages for this story.
Escobar was not city manager in 2024 when the deal with SoCalGas was made. Out of the five council members who approved the agreement, two are no longer in office. (One did not seek reelection; the other finished last in a five-way race.)
Cassy Ortiz, one of the two recently elected council members, promised during the April 22 meeting to listen to resident concerns – but not before indicating she rejected many of them after doing her own research.
“We all have our own opinions on things and my role is not to dismiss your concerns, because you are my constituents,” Ortiz said. “You are the people who I am here to listen to and to serve. It’s important that we make decisions that are considered transparent and responsible.”
Some residents remain unconvinced.
“(City leaders) don’t listen to you unless you bring a source they agree with,” Juarez said. “If you bring another source, they say we Googled it and not to trust Google. They think we’re dumb.”