The Kettleman Hills is a low mountain range of the interior

California Coast Ranges The Coast Ranges of California span from Del Norte County, California, Del Norte or Humboldt County, California, south to Santa Barbara County, California, Santa Barbara County. The other three coastal California mountain ranges are the Trans ...

, in western

Kings County, California Kings County is a county located in the U.S. state of California. The population was 152,486 at the 2020 census. The county seat is Hanford. Kings County comprises the Hanford- Corcoran, CA metropolitan statistical area, which is also inc ...

. It is a northwest–southeast trending line of hills about 30 miles long which parallels the

San Andreas Fault The San Andreas Fault is a continental Fault (geology)#Strike-slip faults, right-lateral strike-slip transform fault that extends roughly through the U.S. state of California. It forms part of the tectonics, tectonic boundary between the Paci ...

to the west. The Kettleman Hills are named (though misspelled) after Dave Kettelman, a pioneer sheep and cattle rancher who grazed his animals there in the 1860s.Brown, Robert R. and Richmond, J.E., ''History of Kings County'', p.123, A.H. Cawston, Hanford, CA, 1940 The hills, which rise to an elevation of approximately , divide the

San Joaquin Valley The San Joaquin Valley ( ; Spanish language in California, Spanish: ''Valle de San Joaquín'') is the southern half of California's Central Valley (California), Central Valley. Famed as a major breadbasket, the San Joaquin Valley is an importa ...

on the east from the much smaller Kettleman Plain to the west. They are the location of the

Kettleman North Dome Oil Field The Kettleman North Dome Oil Field is a large oil and gas field in Kings County, California, Kings and Fresno County, California, Fresno counties, California. Discovered in 1928, it is the fifteenth largest field in the state by total ultimate oil ...

. The Kettleman Hills Hazardous Waste Facility, a large ()

hazardous waste Hazardous waste is waste that must be handled properly to avoid damaging human health or the environment. Waste can be hazardous because it is Toxicity, toxic, Chemical reaction, reacts violently with other chemicals, or is Corrosion, corrosive, ...

and

municipal solid waste Municipal solid waste (MSW), commonly known as trash or garbage in the American English, United States and rubbish in British English, Britain, is a List of waste types, waste type consisting of everyday items that are discarded by the public. ...

disposal facility operated by

Waste Management, Inc. Waste Management, Inc., doing business as WM, is a waste management, comprehensive waste, and environmental services company operating in North America. Founded in 1968, the company is headquartered in the Bank of America Tower in Houston, Te ...

, is located southwest of Kettleman City on State Route 41.

References

California Coast Ranges Mountain ranges of Northern California Mountain ranges of Kings County, California Geography of the San Joaquin Valley {{KingsCountyCA-geo-stub