elk hills
I guess this kid, Casey Hoerth, who sold mortgages at Countrywide, knows a lot about geology, lol. I can't believe you would read that article and take away a negative. OXY is doing quite well in the San Joaquin valley. You might want to read the bit again about them sitting on 7 billion barrels equivalent in the Monterey as well as their Gunslinger find.
To look only at Elk Hills for a second, the area has multiple producing horizons and water is different in each one. Water dispersion wells are often used, and profitablity is good. There is also the Monterey Shale under this area which has been shown to respond very well to acidization. This may possiblity replace fracking as a efficient way to recover the billions of barrels the Monterey holds.
Vince mentioned Rango is the only other player at Elk Hills which makes you wonder if OXY would do a buy out of that land (or the whole company)??!