> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://machina.mmalc.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Sonoma County authorized a quarter-million-gallon fuel-farm study at STS. What became of it? - URL: https://machina.mmalc.com/sts-fuel-farm/ - Published: 2026-08-19T14:39:41.000Z - Updated: 2026-08-19T14:46:40.000Z - Description: Sonoma County funded a study of a quarter-million-gallon fuel farm at Charles M. Schulz–Sonoma County Airport. Ten months on, the public record won't say what became of it. - Author: mmalc Crawford On October 7, 2025, the Sonoma County Board of Supervisors authorized the director of Sonoma Public Infrastructure to execute a $201,759 task order with Mead & Hunt for planning and preliminary engineering for a potential centralized aviation fuel-storage facility at Charles M. Schulz–Sonoma County Airport (STS). The contemplated capacity was approximately 200,000 to 250,000 gallons. The preferred site was an approximately 2.75-acre county-owned parcel near Becker Boulevard and North Laughlin Road, just south of the Pacific Coast Air Museum. The vote did not approve construction of a fuel farm. It authorized the first phase of investigation: analyzing fuel-capacity needs, evaluating the site, preparing conceptual layouts, identifying utility and stormwater requirements, examining relevant codes and regulations, and estimating construction costs. County documents call the principal deliverable a “Preliminary Concept Budget Report,” at no more than a 25-percent design level. The scope said the report would also assist the County and its environmental consultant, RS&H, with environmental documentation required before the engineering-design phase and would include a preliminary schedule for environmental analysis, final design, permitting and construction. The County described a joint-use facility that could be shared by the airport's fixed-base operators and accommodate Jet A, aviation gasoline and sustainable alternative fuels. The *Press Democrat* reported that existing storage capacity at the airport totals about 100,000 gallons — 80,000 gallons for jet fuel and 20,000 for general aviation fuel. The contemplated facility would therefore have between two and two-and-a-half times the airport's existing storage capacity. Beyond consolidation, the Board materials did not explain the basis for the preliminary 200,000-to-250,000-gallon range. Analyzing historic fuel volumes, consulting the operators and recommending appropriate storage capacity based on current needs and forecast demand were among the tasks assigned to Mead & Hunt. What happened after the Board's authorization is not apparent from the public record reviewed for this article. The version of Task Order #19 published with the Board packet has blank signature and date lines. That does not mean it was never subsequently executed; it means the agenda materials do not answer the question. The proposed schedule called for data collection and review within 45 days of a County notice to proceed, followed by a draft report within another 90 days and a final report within 20 days after receipt of the County's comments. Those records do not establish whether a notice to proceed was issued, how much has been invoiced or paid, or whether any of the specified deliverables were produced. As of August 18, an inquiry to the airport about the study's status had not received a response, and a public-records request for material concerning the study remained pending. That uncertainty does not prove the project is active, and it does not prove it has been canceled. It does leave the public unable to answer a basic question about a proposal that reached the point of a six-figure authorization: what became of it? The answer matters in part because storing and transferring aviation fuel can produce air emissions of its own. The amount and composition would depend on the facility's design and operation, and the applicable permitting process exists to quantify those emissions and assess the resulting health risks. Residents in communities around the airport have a reasonable interest in knowing whether that process is approaching, has been deferred or may no longer be necessary. ## What a fuel farm emits depends on its design, not just its size Public discussion of airport pollution tends to focus on aircraft exhaust. A fuel-storage facility presents a separate stationary-source issue. Storing and transferring aviation fuel can release volatile organic compounds, or VOCs. VOCs are a broad class of chemicals rather than a single pollutant, and their effects vary. Some contribute to the formation of ground-level ozone; some can cause health effects when inhaled; and some — benzene among them — are carcinogens. Aviation gasoline, or avgas, is used mainly by smaller piston-engine aircraft and is comparatively volatile. A fixed-roof tank storing it can have standing or “breathing” losses as changes in temperature and pressure cause the vapor space above the liquid to expand and contract. Jet A, used by jet and turboprop aircraft including scheduled airline flights, is a heavier and less volatile kerosene-based fuel, so its breathing losses are generally much smaller. Depending on throughput, a more significant evaporative source may be working losses as incoming fuel displaces vapor from a storage tank. Loading fuel into trucks or aircraft can create additional transfer emissions. The extent of these emissions depends on such details as tank type, fuel composition and throughput, operating practices and vapor controls. What ultimately reaches people is a further question — of how the emissions disperse and where people may be exposed. Preliminary engineering would establish the facility's design and operating assumptions; Air District permit review would use those details to quantify emissions and, where required, assess the resulting exposure and health risk. ## What the Air District says the project would require On July 11, 2026, this publication wrote to the Bay Area Air District asking what regulatory requirements would apply and what, if anything, the district had received from Sonoma County about the proposal. Dr. Philip Fine, the district's executive officer and air pollution control officer, replied on July 28. The Air District said it had received no information or outreach from Sonoma County about the proposed facility and that no pre-application consultation had taken place. It also confirmed that an Authority to Construct would be required before construction of a stationary source of air pollution could begin. During permit review, the district said, it would quantify criteria pollutants and toxic air contaminants, including benzene. Because benzene is a known human carcinogen, the relevant question is not simply whether it can cause harm, but how much a particular facility would emit, how those emissions would disperse, and what exposure would result at homes and other receptor locations. If toxic emissions exceed the health-protective screening thresholds in Regulation 2, Rule 5, a Health Risk Assessment would be required. The rule can require Best Available Control Technology for Toxics when the modeled risk from an individual new or modified source exceeds specified thresholds. It also establishes project-level limits beyond which the Air District may not issue a permit. As the district put it in its July 28 letter, the project “must pass the project risk requirements in the rule in order to obtain an Authority to Construct.” The Air District permit would consider emissions attributable to the proposed facility. Sonoma County, as lead agency under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), would separately be responsible for evaluating baseline conditions and cumulative impacts — what the facility would add to the pollution burden already present in the surrounding area. The Air District provides CEQA guidance, but its permit review would not substitute for the County's analysis. The district also cautioned that ambient or fence-line monitoring is not ordinarily required as a condition of a stationary-source permit except in particular circumstances specified by its regulations. Whether baseline monitoring or a broader cumulative-impact analysis would be warranted here would therefore be principally a matter for Sonoma County through CEQA, rather than something automatically required by the Air District permit. ## What the public record does — and does not — show The Air District's letter does not establish that Sonoma County missed a deadline or was required to consult the district before beginning conceptual work. Nor does it reveal whether that work proceeded. It establishes only that, as of July 28, the Air District had received no information or outreach and that no pre-application consultation had occurred. That absence is notable against what the study was scoped to do. Task Order #19 directed Mead & Hunt to coordinate with the County's environmental consultant to document the project's anticipated CEQA and federal environmental review, and to prepare a preliminary schedule for that review, permitting and construction. The concept report was meant, in other words, to begin mapping the environmental and permitting path — and the agency that would have to issue the air permit at the end of it had, as of late July, heard nothing about the project. If the study is continuing, the public record does not show what environmental work followed or when the Air District will be consulted. If the task order was never executed, or if the work has been paused or abandoned, the public record reviewed for this article does not clearly disclose that either. In both cases the immediate issue is one of public information: the Board authorized a substantial investigation of a large fuel-storage facility, but residents cannot readily determine what became of it. The structure of the authorization may help explain the limited visibility. The Board delegated authority to execute the task order to the director of Sonoma Public Infrastructure. Signing it, issuing a notice to proceed, and later continuing, pausing or terminating work under that delegated authority might not produce another Board vote or an obvious trail through subsequent meeting agendas. The absence of a later agenda item therefore cannot establish the project's status. The outstanding questions are straightforward: - Was the task order executed, and was a notice to proceed issued? - How much, if anything, has the County paid or committed? - Were the initial fuel-storage analysis or the draft and final Preliminary Concept Budget Reports produced? - Is the study active, paused, completed or canceled — and, if it is continuing, when does the County expect to consult the Air District? ## Why asking now is reasonable None of this means the proposed facility would fail a Health Risk Assessment, exceed an emissions threshold or present an unacceptable danger to surrounding communities. The necessary design details and modeling are not publicly available. Nor does the Air District's letter establish that Sonoma County failed to begin any CEQA work that may be required. A fuel-storage proposal approaching a quarter-million gallons does not have to be shown to be dangerous before the public asks how its risks would be assessed. Preliminary engineering is supposed to provide the design and operating information needed for environmental review and permitting to answer those questions before construction, while design choices and controls can still be changed. That remains true whatever the study's present status. If it is moving ahead, residents have a legitimate interest in its design, environmental review and permitting. If it was paused or abandoned, the public has a legitimate interest in knowing when and why. The Board authorized up to $201,759 to investigate a facility of this scale; the public record reviewed for this article does not show what became of that investigation. That warrants a clear answer. --- *This article was researched and drafted in collaboration with Claude, Anthropic's AI assistant.* --- ## Sources - [Sonoma County Board of Supervisors meeting record, October 7, 2025, showing Item 2025-0909 approved as recommended](https://sonoma-county.legistar.com/MeetingDetail.aspx?GUID=B75475B3-DF5F-4DC6-8D3B-1CC83188A82C&ID=1245368&Search=&ref=machina.mmalc.com) - [Sonoma County Board Item 2025-0909, summary report and attachments](https://sonoma-county.legistar.com/LegislationDetail.aspx?GUID=8086B267-ADD7-40FA-AB14-26812430B1D9&ID=7685599&Options=&Search=&ref=machina.mmalc.com) - [Mead & Hunt Task Order #19 and detailed scope of services](https://sonoma-county.legistar.com/View.ashx?GUID=7F13F074-98FF-4312-AA39-67C0DF6A538F&ID=14824509&M=F&ref=machina.mmalc.com) - [*The Press Democrat*, report on the Sonoma County airport fuel-storage proposal, October 8, 2025](https://www.pressdemocrat.com/2025/10/08/sonoma-county-airport-fuel-storage-proposal/?ref=machina.mmalc.com) - [Bay Area Air District, Regulation 2, Rule 5, *New Source Review of Toxic Air Contaminants*](https://www.baaqmd.gov/~/media/dotgov/files/rules/reg-2-permits/2021-amendments/documents/20211215%5Frg0205-pdf.pdf?ref=machina.mmalc.com) - [Bay Area Air District, CEQA guidance](https://www.baaqmd.gov/en/plans-and-climate/california-environmental-quality-act-ceqa/updated-ceqa-guidelines?ref=machina.mmalc.com) - [International Agency for Research on Cancer, explanation of IARC Monographs classifications](https://monographs.iarc.who.int/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/IARCMonographs-QA.pdf?ref=machina.mmalc.com) - [U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, AP-42, Chapter 7, *Liquid Storage Tanks*](https://www.epa.gov/air-emissions-factors-and-quantification/ap-42-fifth-edition-volume-i-chapter-7-liquid-storage-0?ref=machina.mmalc.com) - Bay Area Air District letter from Dr. Philip Fine to Malcolm Crawford, July 28, 2026 (copy held by the author).