The Pain At The Pump

[sauerkraut]

We are being "Denied Access" to gasoline!

Not if your rich. The rich have no problems with $6.00 a gallon gasoline, it will only take the poor & working class people off the roads.

[Teatownclown]

It is true that the US is currently an oil "exporter,* but global supplies are down. It's not just speculation, folks.

[nathanm]

the  democrats and the EPA choking are our nations fuel development

Yes, that is so much like reality that I commend you. Or not. Perhaps you aren't aware of this but natural gas prices are presently rather low. Kinda shoots your theory all to smile.

Edited to add: Another thing you might not be aware of: The US' oil consumption is about 3 and a half times current production. You seriously think we can more than triple production? You seriously think that we wouldn't have already done that if it were possible?

[AquaMan]

Gasoline is like food we need it for our modern lifestyle and we have to pay whatever price they ask. I plan to deal with it by helping to get Obama out of office. Mitt, Newt or Rick anyone but Obama in 2012.... Domestic  oil  Drilling is down 40% on federal lands, we are short refinery capacity, Obama closed some Texas refineries. Gasoline is always high with democrats in control- remember the Jimmy Carter gas lines and dry gas stations, odd-even rationing, all because of OPEC's embargo, since we can't drill for our own oil.

Is Shadows your father or grandfather?

[Conan71]

Gasoline is like food we need it for our modern lifestyle and we have to pay whatever price they ask. I plan to deal with it by helping to get Obama out of office. Mitt, Newt or Rick anyone but Obama in 2012.... Domestic  oil  Drilling is down 40% on federal lands, we are short refinery capacity, Obama closed some Texas refineries. Gasoline is always high with democrats in control- remember the Jimmy Carter gas lines and dry gas stations, odd-even rationing, all because of OPEC's embargo, since we can't drill for our own oil.

You seem to forget that gas was around $1.25 a gallon when the second President Bush took office.  July of 2008, it was nearly $4.00 a gallon here in Tulsa. 

There again, with Bush's fiscal policy, he may well have been a closet liberal.

[Red Arrow]

You seriously think we can more than triple production? You seriously think that we wouldn't have already done that if it were possible?

I don't think we could easily triple production.   It may be possible but the drive to push alternative energy would insure that regulations would make it impossible.

[Red Arrow]

Not if your rich. The rich have no problems with $6.00 a gallon gasoline, it will only take the poor & working class people off the roads.

I believe you missed the context since the post that set it up was in another thread.  You would have seen it if you were viewing the most recent posts vs. just following one thread. Try to mix it up a bit.

[carltonplace]

Now that you mention it, he's starting to look like Gollum.

   

Poor Smeagle...why does it cry?

[carltonplace]

The USA is said to be the OPEC of natural gas, we have natural gas up the wazoo-- but like with oil, the  democrats and the EPA choking are our nations fuel development. They want windmills that have been tryed and failed in the past, and solar power that is expensive and does not work well.. Natural gas in cars burns very clean, engines last longer, it's cheap. Why not a hybred that burns gasoline & natural gas? We have hybreds for gasoline and E-85, and gasoline & Expensive batteries... Another idea - What about making natural gas cars and also having gasoline cars? The compition between the two fuels will lower the cost of gasoline. Nothing like this will happen as long as we have radicals like Obama in control.

Speaking of "hybreds" [sp], I think I just ran accross one.

[Teatownclown]

The USA is said to be the OPEC of natural gas, we have natural gas up the wazoo-- but like with oil, the  democrats and the EPA choking are our nations fuel development. They want windmills that have been tryed and failed in the past, and solar power that is expensive and does not work well.. Natural gas in cars burns very clean, engines last longer, it's cheap. Why not a hybred that burns gasoline & natural gas? We have hybreds for gasoline and E-85, and gasoline & Expensive batteries... Another idea - What about making natural gas cars and also having gasoline cars? The compition between the two fuels will lower the cost of gasoline. Nothing like this will happen as long as we have radicals like Obama in control.

You goof....read up! The mega oil and gas companies want to produce income with little desire to continue improving the needed infra structure to deliver their gas in order to create the demand for vehicles powered by their own products. Instead, they (mostly 'less government" types) want their subsidies and tax breaks in order to set up the logical placement of points of delivery. Call your stupid idiot representatives in Congress and quit scapegoating Obama....

REVIEW & OUTLOOKFEBRUARY 29, 2012
Boone-Doggle
The natural gas industry doesn't need subsidies.


Something about energy policy causes Republicans and even many conservatives to abandon every free-market principle they claim to believe and embrace corporate welfare. The latest example comes courtesy of our sometime intellectual ally, Texas billionaire Boone Pickens, who is pushing the Nat Gas Act.

Mr. Pickens wants to pour subsidies on the production and purchase of vehicles that use natural gas as a transportation fuel. With conventional gasoline prices approaching $4 a gallon in many markets, this is the hottest energy fad in Washington and has had as many as 180 House co-sponsors, including, at last count, 72 Republicans.

The Pickens plan got a big lift when Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid introduced a version of the bill with fellow Democrat Robert Menendez of New Jersey and North Carolina Republican Richard Burr, a rare case of bipartisan agreement.

***
"Natural gas is cheap, clean, abundant, and it's ours," Mr. Pickens says, and he's right. Breakthroughs in drilling technologies, such as hydraulic fracturing in shale, have increased America's recoverable reserves of natural gas at a low cost. Natural gas prices have remained low and stable this year even as oil prices have fluctuated and topped $100 a barrel. Natural gas is already supplanting coal plants for electricity in many places and is likely to keep doing so unless environmentalists kill the fracking industry.

But natural gas isn't widespread as a transportation fuel, and Mr. Pickens wants to dun taxpayers to change that. The Nat Gas Act would provide tax credits between $7,500 and $65,000 per vehicle to convert 150,000 U.S. light trucks and heavy 18-wheelers to natural gas engines from those powered by diesel oil. The bill would also provide a tax credit to the manufacturers of natural gas vehicles.

There's more. The 50 cent a gallon alternative fuel credit for purchasing natural gas at the pump would be extended for five years through 2016. On top of that, service stations would get a tax credit of up to $100,000 to buy the pumps and other equipment to provide natural gas.

Proponents put the cost at about $5 billion over five years, but many energy experts believe it would be multiples higher. Eight million trucks are on the road today, and if each got a $15,000 average tax credit, the price tag grows to over $100 billion.

The natural gas shale revolution is a blessing for the U.S., but its very abundance and low cost mean that it could be a commercially viable substitute for oil without taxpayer handouts. At current prices, a gallon of transportation fuel from natural gas costs about one-third to one-half less a gallon of gas from oil. That's a big nonsubsidized cost advantage.

Mr. Pickens claims that the subsidies are merely to finance the transition to natural gas vehicles, and that they will be temporary. But there were no subsidies for Henry Ford to build the Model T, and no tax incentives for gas stations in every town in America.

As for "energy independence," taxpayer subsidies have a miserable record of reducing reliance on foreign oil. In the 1970s the feds spent some $2 billion on synthetic fuels, which were a commercial bust. Ethanol was sold as a path to energy "security," but 30 years and more than $40 billion later it still can't compete without governmental support. The two-decade federal nourishment of solar, wind and other non-hydro renewables has cost tens of billions of dollars, yet they still provide just 3.6% of U.S. electricity.

The history of energy subsidies is that they become an industrial and political addiction that is difficult to stop, no matter the results, and may even inhibit innovation and profitability by providing a crutch.

We are also told that government must subsidize natural gas because the OPEC cartel blocks a free market in oil. But OPEC is not the only price-setter in oil markets, and in any case the point of a cartel is to hold the market price artificially high, which should help natural gas and renewables. If the world is running out of oil (doubtful), and prices will rise over time (maybe), this should only make natural gas more promising without federal help.

Equally dubious is the claim that natural gas subsidies would merely "level the playing field" because oil also gets tax breaks. We'd prefer no breaks for any industry, but the modest benefits for oil include tax write-offs that every manufacturer gets. In any case the Nat Gas Act would provide subsidies many times greater per unit of BTU.

***
The big transportation debate of the moment is whether the future belongs to natural gas vehicles, battery-operated cars or hybrids, or whether new sources of oil will keep gasoline, diesel and the internal-combustion engine paramount. Who knows?

But we do know who doesn't know: Congress. Best to let millions of investors and consumers—otherwise known as a market—decide these fates rather than blowing $5 billion, or $100 billion, and creating another industry that depends on political intervention for its survival. One reason the U.S. has trillion-dollar deficits is because too many Republicans too often forget that they were elected to end subsidies and earmarks, not to create new ones.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304070104576395662990512484.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

[Gaspar]

The middle class won't be impacted immediately by gas prices, nor will the wealthy.  It will suck for the poor though.  They will get several waves of pain as the energy sector suffers.  First, their cost of living goes up immediately, and if they are paycheck to paycheck they won't have any reserve to offset.  The double whammy is that when the middle class, who tend to be very elastic in their spending, start to contract their spending on things like eating out, Starbucks, and entertainment, the poor who hold most of the service jobs in those industries will see a drop in their employment.  Now they have fewer jobs and higher living expenses.  The incidence of default will increase, and with that, the cost will be passed back up to the middle class who holds the vast majority of investment capital. 

Eventually energy prices effect everyone, but their is quite a delay from the time the poor become destitute until the middle class and wealthy feel the squeeze. We have seen this scenario play out before.  I predict that unless prices go down, once you see $5 gas, you will also see security guards posted at filling stations, and stations shutting down or reducing their hours in the "bad neighborhoods."

Ignoring energy costs as the prime economic manipulator in an economy is a very elitist position for a politician.  You have to be able to ignore the impact on "the less fortunate" or deem them politically insignificant.  You also have to convince society that high energy and production costs are somehow a good thing.

[AquaMan]

Such a negative Nellie. Consider that trucks, SUV's and performance cars are going to get cheaper and cheaper. Your old bicycle, as Conan notes, will be worth more than ever and MTTA buses will once again start to fill up.

Seriously, I doubt any politician IN power ignores rising fuel costs. The only ones who want to see $5 gasoline are running FOR positions of power.

[Teatownclown]

The middle class won't be impacted immediately by gas prices, nor will the wealthy.  It will suck for the poor though.  They will get several waves of pain as the energy sector suffers.  First, their cost of living goes up immediately, and if they are paycheck to paycheck they won't have any reserve to offset.  The double whammy is that when the middle class, who tend to be very elastic in their spending, start to contract their spending on things like eating out, Starbucks, and entertainment, the poor who hold most of the service jobs in those industries will see a drop in their employment.  Now they have fewer jobs and higher living expenses.  The incidence of default will increase, and with that, the cost will be passed back up to the middle class who holds the vast majority of investment capital. 

Eventually energy prices effect everyone, but their is quite a delay from the time the poor become destitute until the middle class and wealthy feel the squeeze. We have seen this scenario play out before.  I predict that unless prices go down, once you see $5 gas, you will also see security guards posted at filling stations, and stations shutting down or reducing their hours in the "bad neighborhoods."

Ignoring energy costs as the prime economic manipulator in an economy is a very elitist position for a politician.  You have to be able to ignore the impact on "the less fortunate" or deem them politically insignificant.  You also have to convince society that high energy and production costs are somehow a good thing.

You're pretty removed from reality to think what will be left of a middle class holds the vast majority of investment capital. That has been and continues to be the %1 who seem to be complacent in placing the proper infrastructure to facilitate the sale of Natural Gas for vehicles to travel across country. And, maybe when gas gets to $7 we might see armed guards. And who will pay for them? Or will they be government security?

[DolfanBob]

You're pretty removed from reality to think what will be left of a middle class holds the vast majority of investment capital. That has been and continues to be the %1 who seem to be complacent in placing the proper infrastructure to facilitate the sale of Natural Gas for vehicles to travel across country. And, maybe when gas gets to $7 we might see armed guards. And who will pay for them? Or will they be government security?

And they will probably be paid a gallon a hour.

[DTowner]

You're pretty removed from reality to think what will be left of a middle class holds the vast majority of investment capital. That has been and continues to be the %1 who seem to be complacent in placing the proper infrastructure to facilitate the sale of Natural Gas for vehicles to travel across country. And, maybe when gas gets to $7 we might see armed guards. And who will pay for them? Or will they be government security?

In Detroit, they want to force the station owners to pay for guards.

http://www.myfoxdetroit.com/dpp/news/local/detroit-city-councilman-wants-guards-at-gas-stations-20120228-kb