Gas Prices -- Help at last?

Agreed, OT, and just another win for BIG OIL. I hope the senate has a
better handle on what subsidies look like and what profits are for...

Did you READ the article? There hasn't been a new refinery built in the
U.S. since I was a senior in high school -- 29 years ago!

Gee, don't you think that *maybe* we might have gone a wee bit too far with
gubmint regulations?
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

Jay Honeck wrote:

Agreed, OT, and just another win for BIG OIL. I hope the senate has a
better handle on what subsidies look like and what profits are for...


Did you READ the article?

Of course he didn't, the facts might get in the way of a preconceived
notion.

"Newps" wrote in message
...
Jay Honeck wrote:
Agreed, OT, and just another win for BIG OIL. I hope the senate has a
better handle on what subsidies look like and what profits are for...

Did you READ the article?

Of course he didn't, the facts might get in the way of a preconceived
notion.

Apparently neither of you read the article.

The lack of new refineries means nothing, except (as Dave S pointed out)
that the oil companies don't need new refineries to meet their demand and
they don't feel like investing in their own future, except if they can get
taxpayers to subsidize it, and if they can be released from their
obligations to the environment.

The article, which neither of you apparently read, pointed out that not only
have no new refineries been built, oil companies have CLOSED refineries
already built. If they need refineries so badly, why did they close the
ones they had?

Furthermore, whether passing this bill was the right answer or not, the
article points out that it was done in a very underhanded way. At one
point, they had 424 votes, against the bill. Somehow, they managed to
REDUCE the vote count (to 422) and yet increase the number of "ayes". In
what world is it reasonable to just keep recounting the votes until you get
the answer you want? (Please, no one from Washington State answer that one
). The House voting rules provide for five minutes to count the vote,
and yet the Representative standing in for the oh-so-honorable Tom DeLay
held the vote open for more than 40 minutes, waiting until he and his
friends were able to pork-barrel the votes their way.

All of the above is in the article. Why didn't either of you notice those
facts?

Thankfully, the bill did retain the environmental protections required of
the oil companies. But otherwise, it's a huge win for the oil companies,
and unlikely to be much of a real benefit for consumers. We probably do
need more refineries, if for no other reason than to provide backup capacity
for situations like the hurricanes. But oil companies make plenty of
money...there's absolutely no reason they can't provide their own investment
in their own future.

Any taxpayer that thinks that they will wind up paying less money overall by
funding new refineries is fooling themself.

Pete

"Newps" wrote:

Jay Honeck wrote:

Agreed, OT, and just another win for BIG OIL. I hope the senate has a
better handle on what subsidies look like and what profits are for...


Did you READ the article?

Of course he didn't, the facts might get in the way of a preconceived
notion.

Boom!

Dammit. Another irony meter blown to smithereens.

Jay Honeck wrote:
Agreed, OT, and just another win for BIG OIL. I hope the senate has a
better handle on what subsidies look like and what profits are for...


Did you READ the article? There hasn't been a new refinery built in the
U.S. since I was a senior in high school -- 29 years ago!

Gee, don't you think that *maybe* we might have gone a wee bit too far with
gubmint regulations?

Yes, Jay.. I read the whole story.. and I knew that fact long before it
was posted in here.. (gasoline refineries). There HAVE however, been all
sorts of OTHER petrochemical units and operations built since then. I
participated in the new construction of a Polypropylene unit a little
over 10 years ago. The truth is.. the OLD gasoline refineries were all
grandfathered. They were permitted to operated DIRTY, and CHEAPLY. Tis
is all about profits.

The oil companies havent gone into bankruptcy in droves over 20 odd
years, if anything they have made money hand over fist. They have not
increased their refining capacity because it would decrease their
overall PROFIT margin. Building new refining capacity to "standard"
would drive their incremental cost of production UP, and eat into the
stockholders dividends. But make no mistake, it would still be PROFIT.

What we are celebrating is the deliberate browbeating of the elected
Republican representatives of the House by the Republican Leadership. I
will bet dollars to doughnuts that they made it clear - vote against us
and we will REPLACE you at the next election with another fellow
Republican who is loyal. The fact that the election was held open until
the bill passed supports that claim.

You want the truth about oil and gas prices? 5 weeks ago when the oil
prices his $70 or so a barrel, the gas prices popped up over $3 a gallon
within days. The OIL that was that expensive was still to be in the boat
being shipped over from Saudi and Venezuela for days to weeks longer. We
paid a premium on refined product that was already in the inventory.
Legalized price gouging, anyone?

You wanted OT.. you got it
Dave

"Dave S" wrote in message
news


Jay Honeck wrote:
Agreed, OT, and just another win for BIG OIL. I hope the senate has a
better handle on what subsidies look like and what profits are for...


Did you READ the article? There hasn't been a new refinery built in the
U.S. since I was a senior in high school -- 29 years ago!

Gee, don't you think that *maybe* we might have gone a wee bit too far
with gubmint regulations?

Yes, Jay.. I read the whole story.. and I knew that fact long before it
was posted in here.. (gasoline refineries). There HAVE however, been all
sorts of OTHER petrochemical units and operations built since then. I
participated in the new construction of a Polypropylene unit a little over
10 years ago. The truth is.. the OLD gasoline refineries were all
grandfathered. They were permitted to operated DIRTY, and CHEAPLY.

No, they haven't; they are just as susceptible to federal and local
regulations as ever.

And older plants are COSTLY to operate, mainly due to maintenance costs.

Tis is all about profits.

Or an agenda.


The oil companies havent gone into bankruptcy in droves over 20 odd years,
if anything they have made money hand over fist.

In most years they make less profit than the Feds and states take in fuel
taxes.

They have not increased their refining capacity because it would decrease
their overall PROFIT margin. Building new refining capacity to "standard"
would drive their incremental cost of production UP, and eat into the
stockholders dividends. But make no mistake, it would still be PROFIT.

So why should they use their profits and capital to build more capacity when
so many just squeal and whine?


What we are celebrating is the deliberate browbeating of the elected
Republican representatives of the House by the Republican Leadership. I
will bet dollars to doughnuts that they made it clear - vote against us
and we will REPLACE you at the next election with another fellow
Republican who is loyal. The fact that the election was held open until
the bill passed supports that claim.

You want the truth about oil and gas prices? 5 weeks ago when the oil
prices his $70 or so a barrel, the gas prices popped up over $3 a gallon
within days.

You grasp of an issue with mutiple facets is...lacking.

The OIL that was that expensive was still to be in the boat being shipped
over from Saudi and Venezuela for days to weeks longer. We paid a premium
on refined product that was already in the inventory. Legalized price
gouging, anyone?

If the market says the next boat load will cost 10-20-30% more, just how
would YOU price your inventory?

You wanted OT.. you got it

And you're (relatively) clueless.

--
Matt

---------------------
Matthew W. Barrow
Site-Fill Homes, LLC.
Montrose, CO

The oil companies havent gone into bankruptcy in droves over 20 odd years,
if anything they have made money hand over fist. They have not increased
their refining capacity because it would decrease their overall PROFIT
margin. Building new refining capacity to "standard" would drive their
incremental cost of production UP, and eat into the stockholders
dividends. But make no mistake, it would still be PROFIT.

You say that like it's somehow wrong. That, my friend, is the Capitalist
system.

Stockholders (owners) want a return on their money. Anything that is seen
as a stupid, costly impediment (read: Over-regulation of new oil refineries)
to providing a return on their money isn't going to be done. Any person who
orders such action risks (at least) his job.

What we are celebrating is the deliberate browbeating of the elected
Republican representatives of the House by the Republican Leadership. I
will bet dollars to doughnuts that they made it clear - vote against us
and we will REPLACE you at the next election with another fellow
Republican who is loyal. The fact that the election was held open until
the bill passed supports that claim.

Tsk. Welcome to the world of party discipline. When the party leadership
wants their troops to fall in line, all sorts of behind-the-scenes
arm-twisting goes on. (And ours is NOTHING compared to most systems. You
should see Britain's Parliament in action!)

You want the truth about oil and gas prices? 5 weeks ago when the oil
prices his $70 or so a barrel, the gas prices popped up over $3 a gallon
within days. The OIL that was that expensive was still to be in the boat
being shipped over from Saudi and Venezuela for days to weeks longer. We
paid a premium on refined product that was already in the inventory.
Legalized price gouging, anyone?

I'm not one to defend the oil companies, and I'm as ****ed about gas prices
as anyone. On the other hand, the facts speak for themselves. When no new
oil refineries -- none, zero, zilch, nada -- have been built in a
generation, there is a REASON. And you can't just sit there and blame it on
individual (or collective) greed, cuz that dog don't hunt -- especially when
construction of refineries ceased at precisely the same moment the new
regulations were rolled out.
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"

"Dave S" wrote in message
news
The oil companies havent gone into bankruptcy in droves over 20 odd years,
if anything they have made money hand over fist. They have not increased
their refining capacity because it would decrease their overall PROFIT
margin. Building new refining capacity to "standard" would drive their
incremental cost of production UP, and eat into the stockholders
dividends. But make no mistake, it would still be PROFIT.


Refining capacity for gasoline has increased 3X over the period while no new
refineries were built.

Mike
MU-2

On Sat, 08 Oct 2005 05:36:35 GMT, Dave S
wrote:



Jay Honeck wrote:
Agreed, OT, and just another win for BIG OIL. I hope the senate has a
better handle on what subsidies look like and what profits are for...


Did you READ the article? There hasn't been a new refinery built in the
U.S. since I was a senior in high school -- 29 years ago!

snip

The oil companies havent gone into bankruptcy in droves over 20 odd
years, if anything they have made money hand over fist. They have not
increased their refining capacity because it would decrease their
overall PROFIT margin. Building new refining capacity to "standard"
would drive their incremental cost of production UP, and eat into the
stockholders dividends. But make no mistake, it would still be PROFIT.

What we are celebrating is the deliberate browbeating of the elected
Republican representatives of the House by the Republican Leadership. I
What we are seeing is two things.
Environmental regs that are preventing new refineries, but new
refineries would be one of the worst mistakes we could make.

The refineries are getting rich and we are becoming more dependent on
foreign oil for one reason. The whole system operates on supply and
demand. If we as individuals didn't use so much of the stuff the
refineries wouldn't be charging so much, we wouldn't be importing so
much and the world would be a more peaceful place.

If I have my figures any where near correct, if we had a quarter of
the cars on the road getting the mileage of the Prius, we'd have no
need for importing oil and the price of oil would go down.

However, I've come to the unhappy conclusion that the average driver
is only going to conserve when forced to do so by high prices. With
prices between $2.75 and $3.00 the demand for crude has already
dropped. At $3.50 the refineries would no longer be operating at
capacity. We really need about 3 or 4 months of at least $3.00 gas.
Then it'll get cheap and the refineries will be operating no where
near capacity so the need to build more will be gone. I'm not
thrilled about paying high prices as I'm retired, on a pension, and
social security, but it's about the only thing that will make people
conserve.

Another unfortunate conclusion is it's going to take fuel prices in
that range to make alternative energy sources widely competitive.

If the drivers conserved to the point of forcing gas prices down
there'd be plenty of capacity for avgas. Unfortunately, some where in
the future I think the higher compression engines (like mine) are
going to require specialty fuels, or additives. Once the higher
powered diesels become widely available 100LL, its equivalent, or
additives for something to get that high are going to make today's
prices look mighty good. The only gas burners left will be the low
compression ones that can burn autogas. Except of course here in
Michigan where they no longer list on the pump whether the gas
contains alcohol or not.

That means there will be a lot of planes in the $60,000 to $120,000
range requiring $50,000 to $60,000 conversions to keep flying. How
many do you think will do that to a plane that is worth about the cost
of the conversion?
snip

You want the truth about oil and gas prices? 5 weeks ago when the oil
prices his $70 or so a barrel, the gas prices popped up over $3 a gallon

Some where along the line some one had to pay for that crude. It's
called speculation.

within days. The OIL that was that expensive was still to be in the boat
being shipped over from Saudi and Venezuela for days to weeks longer. We
paid a premium on refined product that was already in the inventory.
Legalized price gouging, anyone?

It doesn't work that way. You have to pay what it is going to take to
replace what is in the inventory. Then you base future charges on
what you think you are going to have to pay to fill the tanks next
time.

If you want to complain, wait until you see what LP gas does this
winter. As for natural gas, they sold most of ours in Michigan to
California two years ago when California screwed up. We had a nice
reserve until then. There currently is a limited supply that can be
used/accessed so it's going to get down right expensive this winter
and at the mid 30s right now I already have the heat on in both the
house and shop.


Roger Halstead (K8RI & ARRL life member)
(N833R, S# CD-2 Worlds oldest Debonair)
www.rogerhalstead.com


You wanted OT.. you got it
Dave

"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
news:NpE1f.408067$_o.120015@attbi_s71...
Agreed, OT, and just another win for BIG OIL. I hope the senate has a
better handle on what subsidies look like and what profits are for...

Did you READ the article? There hasn't been a new refinery built in the
U.S. since I was a senior in high school -- 29 years ago!

Gee, don't you think that *maybe* we might have gone a wee bit too far
with gubmint regulations?

I'm sure the polls and bureaucrats have all the gas they can handle.


--
Matt

---------------------
Matthew W. Barrow
Site-Fill Homes, LLC.
Montrose, CO