STEVE KNIGHT: “On October 23, a gas leak was discovered at one of the 115 wells at the Aliso Canyon natural gas storage facility…”

“On October 23, a gas leak was discovered at one of the 115 wells at the Aliso Canyon natural gas storage facility located in my district near Porter Ranch, California. I want to thank Congressman Brad Sherman, who lives in Porter Ranch and was a great partner in this terrible tragedy, making sure that people were taken care of and we could move past this and move quickly to getting this taken care of. This leak persisted for 118 days and was recognized as one of the largest disasters of 2015. During this time, residents of the surrounding neighborhoods suffered. Some temporarily relocated their families. Two schools were permanently relocated, at least for that semester, and many businesses were put on hold. As the Representative for Porter Ranch, my immediate priority was to protect my constituents who live there and then ensure that this situation was resolved as quickly as possible. At the same time, I wanted to make sure that a crisis like this can never happen in our communities again. Today we take a giant step forward in doing just that. In February, I introduced the Natural Gas Leak Prevention Act, which would require the Secretary of Transportation to issue adequate safety standards for natural gas storage facilities like Aliso Canyon in Porter Ranch and another very large facility, Honor Rancho in Valencia, which is also in my district.…”