This year’s top contributor to California campaigns is an unexpected fossil fuel giant

An unexpected corporate utility is now the top contributor to politicians seeking state office in California, according to an analysis of campaign finance data from the first half of this year.

Sempra, the parent company of the nation’s largest gas utility SoCalGas as well as San Diego Gas & Electric, contributed more than a quarter of a million dollars to candidates, including half of all sitting California lawmakers, in the first two quarters of 2023.

Climate experts connect Sempra’s campaign spending to a legislative push to support expensive technologies that would help its subsidiaries stay in business and prolong dependence on fossil fuels, particularly hydrogen and carbon capture and storage (CCS). Advocates say lawmakers should consider refusing contributions from fossils writ large — gas included.

“Lawmakers are Sempra’s lifeline and contributions buy them the influence to continue to pollute and produce fossil fuels,” said Nick Magel, director of the California Climate Accountability Project, author of the report.

“Going forward, lawmakers can’t take contributions from Sempra and also claim to be a climate champion.”

Gas cash in California politics

By contributing $252,178 to the campaigns of more than 60 current lawmakers, Sempra outspent oil company Phillips 66 at $173,200 and Calpine at $89,400, found researchers at the California Climate Accountability Project using Secretary of State data.

The top recipients were Southern California assemblymen Rick Zbur, D-Los Angeles, and Eduardo Garcia, D-Coachella, who both received $7,500 from Sempra Energy.

Twenty lawmakers received $5,500, including local assembly members Stephanie Nguyen, D-Elk Grove, Carlos Villapudua, D-Stockton, Lori Wilson, D-Fairfield, and Cecilia Aguiar-Curry, D-Davis. State senator Mari Alvarado-Gil, D-Modesto, also received the same contribution.

All told, major oil and gas players contributed nearly $580,000 in the first half of 2023, the report found. Vince Fong R-Bakersfield, accepted the most contributions from the oil and gas industries this year at $18,500. Among Democrats, Esmeralda Soria, D-Merced, took in the most, at $17,500.

The CA Climate Accountability Project also has a searchable online tool for oil and gas contributions to state lawmakers.

In response to questions about Sempra’s campaign contributions, spokesman Dan Guthrie said the CA Climate Accountability Project’s analysis captured contributions only to individual lawmakers rather than committees, political parties and trade groups that help fund campaigns.

“SoCalGas and SDG&E take a bipartisanship approach to working with California lawmakers,” Guthrie said, “and our funding levels with campaigns or candidates have remained consistent over the last several years..

“It is a privilege to participate in the political process on behalf of the combined 25 million consumers our companies serve to offer input to state policies that are developed to help achieve the climate objectives set by the Governor and Legislature.”

Multiple offices of California lawmakers did not respond to requests for comment.

Many lawmakers deny oil industry contributions but are more lenient with accepting money from the gas industry. Sempra spending in the first two quarters increased by around $100,000 since 2015, the report showed.

“Oil is more vilified and more stigmatized But if you polled Californians with the question ‘How do you feel about a candidate who takes gas money?’ I bet you it’s still a pretty bad number,” Mike Young, political director for California Environmental Voters, said.

Sempra’s hydrogen push

California climate experts see a connection between Sempra’s campaign spending and its legislative advocacy, which in the last year has focused in large part on alternative and expensive low-carbon fuel technologies such as hydrogen and carbon capture.

In the final days of this year’s legislative session, Sempra asked lawmakers to introduce a bill that would allow gas companies to charge ratepayers for company investments in those technologies. The company also helped propose legislation to speed up the approval process for hydrogen production and transportation.

Neither of the bills gained traction. That’s after a final push for more state funding toward hydrogen car fueling stations ended with middling success.

Electrifying most of the state’s economy is a core part of meeting decarbonization goals amid weather extremes caused by climate change. But that agenda poses an existential threat to SoCalGas, which serves 22 million people between San Diego and Fresno.

“They’re a fossil fuel marketer where there are ready substitutes for the product. So it’s very interesting that the parent company is investing so heavily,” said Michael Wara, director of the Climate and Energy Policy Program at Stanford University.

“They’re betting on these technologies and then asking for the state to subsidize them. What they’re really asking for is a guarantee that ratepayers will cover the cost.”

A California Public Utilities Commission proceeding began to address the long-term question of whether the state can preserve its fossil gas system while meeting state climate goals but hasn’t finished, said Wara.

In the meantime, Sempra has been appealing to the legislature for steep investment into the gas system that would ultimately be paid for by Californians.

“The economics of these projects are hard because they probably won’t happen without some kind of state backing,” Wara said. “But do we really want to put taxpayer or ratepayer dollars at risk for this stuff?”

In 2022, fossil gas made up 42% of state electricity generation, and 40 million cubic feet of gas was burned in California homes and businesses. Hydrogen can be produced with a variety of other energy sources, including renewables such as wind and solar, but the vast majority is made with natural or fossil gas.

SoCalGas calls hydrogen a “net-zero carbon footprint” fuel source that can be applied to everything from transportation and buildings to industrial emissions. But those legislative proposals used a definition of “clean” hydrogen that left the door open for blends with polluting gas.

Beyond reducing emissions from their operations, utilities and California climate leaders themselves have promoted CCS and hydrogen infrastructure as ways to preserve energy reliability for when the wind isn’t blowing and the sun isn’t shining.

One project proposed by Sempra is Angeles Link, a hydrogen pipeline that SoCalGas says would use renewable electricity to create hydrogen and then power some natural gas plants, heavy duty transportation and other industry. It has also proposed numerous projects, including blending hydrogen into gas pipelines.

At the federal level, officials are deciding what types of hydrogen projects become eligible for some $100 billion of federal funding — “green” ones that slash emissions or fossil fuel-based projects that increase carbon pollution.

In August, officials submitted support for hydrogen projects with weaker environmental standards than ones favored by climate scientists and environmental groups.