10 years since Aliso Canyon: Disaster was wake-up call for US on dangers of underground gas

On an evening 10 years ago, Porter Ranch resident Matt Pakucko stepped out of his music studio and was walloped by the smell of gas-like sticking your head in an oven, he recalled.

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The event was widely seen as a wake-up call to the dangers of methane and underground natural gas storage. Methane, a planet-warming greenhouse gas, is about 80 times more potent than carbon dioxide and is responsible for about a quarter of all the human-caused climate change we are experiencing.

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A study published by UCLA researchers in September found that women in their final trimester of pregnancy who were living within 6.2 miles downwind of the blowout in 2015 had a nearly 50% higher-than-expected chance of having a low birth-weight baby.

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But experts say there are silver linings to the disaster. California overhauled its underground natural gas storage regulations to make them the strongest in the nation and among the strongest in the world, according to Peltz, of the Environmental Defense Fund. The changes include more thoughtful rules for well construction, better monitoring and risk management, and improved planning and emergency response.

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