No Smoking at the Sunoco Delaware Refinery

[Pablo]

Currently, the price here has jumped from about $1.90/gallon 10 days ago to about $2.20/gallon as of today. By the end of the month it will almost certainly be at $2.50/gallon or more. A rise of 30%+.

Wanna bet it doesn't?

No way. This is not supposed to be happening!!

 

[bamabikeguy]

You, sir, are a true cynic.

I like that in a man, it shows he is thinking.

My younger brother and I were pumping gas, checking oil and washing windshields at my Dad's Country Store, (selling Amoco) in the 1970's.

Right after moving from San Jose to Alabama, we were driving locally at ages 13-14, but I had just got my license when gas doubled, from .30 cents to .60 cents a gallon.

Getting cussed out at the cash register when that doubling took place is deeply imprinted on our mutual psyche, but we learned where to point the finger of blame. Speculation and commodity brokers. When the first embargo hit, it was like all the oil tankers on the ocean disappeared, all the gas at the distilleries and fuel depots was drained.

What happened, the first two 1970's embargos, was 50% of the small Mom & Pop groceries went out of business. You see the empty buildings on your rides in rural areas.

Then in the 1980's they required everybody dig up and replace the underground tanks, at $10,000 a pop, more sole proprietorships closed, and the distributors started getting into the retail business, competing against their own customers, over by the interstates especially. Made most of their money on cola syrup, weak coffee, snacks and cigs. The franchise/distributors took 70% of the retail gas market.

---------------------------------

My brother is now 50 years old, head purchaser for a very large hospital system, and last Thanksgiving, he put forth a unique observation I never read or heard before. No expert on Sunday talk shows ever made the connection.

He knew where a lot of the missing stimulus billions went, why it didn't stimulate anything in 2008.

In other words, he is absolutely sure July 11, 2008was the day the US vault doors were thrown wide open.

And he knows exactly where he was that day. He was "waiting at the mailbox", as the saying goes.

His commute to the UAB Hospital costs him 60 gallons per week.

His "grouping" to receive the last wave of the Economic Stimulus Checks on was on July 11.

He knew when to confirm his checking account balance, when the funds would be available to complete the room addition to his kitchen.

At work he keeps his opinions close to the vest, listening to all the political and social conspiracy talk amongst mighty surgeons and lowly custodians for years. Be he cynic or skeptic, he tracked oil prices at the pumps, which also peaked on that very day, July 11, 2008.

The media didn't catch on, they were looking at NON-events, like Hurricane Ike not effecting the closest oil in our Gulf of Mexico....

Oil price tumbles down
Submitted by Mikael Höök on Tue, 2008-09-16 07:40.

Crude tumbled over 4% to a seven-month low today as it fell for a second day after Lehman Brothers' collapse made investors ditch crude for safe-haven assets and on fears the credit crisis will hurt the real economy.

Reports that Hurricane Ike caused minor damage to US crude platforms and refineries also weighed on prices, adding to the previous session's more than $5 fall and almost 37% decline from its peak above $147 in mid-July.

One should however keep in mind that oil price and actual oil production do not need to follow each other. Since 2005 the world oil production has been virtually flat, despite huge changes in the oil price. Peak Oil and Peak Oil Price is two very different things.

It was not market demand that changed the price !! Think about it.

Whatever Paulson did with TARP funds, or what happened with Standards and Poor's / Moody's and other ratings agencies, where ever those pallets of money in Baghdad disappeared to, (shrug, I dunno.). War profiteering happened.

BUT, that economic stimulus package last year had to be on the chalkboard for months in advance, everybody knew $1,000 checks were going to be mailed out to millions of mostly suburban commuters.

Who got the biggest chunk? Big Oil.

This fits neatly into the meme that online porn also experienced a boom thanks to the stimulus program, the non-auto commuting urbanites are the biggest consumers of virtual stimulations.

Big Oil took the gold.

Laughably, experts and pundits blame Americans causing the recession now, for "saving, not spending", that is pure-d-o-bullsh***.

Big Oil knew in mid 2007 Bush was thinking about dumping billions of "borrowed from China" money into the hands of consumers. BushCo. didn't come up with the idea on a Monday and mail out money by Friday, it took months of preparation.

And all those Texas Mafia had "blind trust funds" heavily invested in Oil and Defense stocks funds.

Big Oil started increasing the price at the pump when the first wave of checks came out in early Spring '08, and just like what happened, when gas went from .30 cents to .60 cents, hard pressed consumers charged the gas on credit cards.

When the last of the money was mailed in July '08, the scam was over.

And when the credit cards maxed out in September, consumers pulled back in purchases, and the house of cards that was the banking business came tumbling right after.

But, the missing billions are now sitting "electronically" off shore, in the Cayman/Bahama/Swiss/Dubai tax haven schemes. Obama et. al. estimate $5-8 trillion is sitting in accounts doing nothing.

It is no conspiracy that Obama plans on getting that idle money back in the system. That's why the corporate propaganda machine is trying to derail him.

But the media won't know he got the money back until he does it.

 

[bamabikeguy]

To elaborate, what happened in the U.S. in 2005?

One should however keep in mind that oil price and actual oil production do not need to follow each other. Since 2005 the world oil production has been virtually flat, despite huge changes in the oil price. Peak Oil and Peak Oil Price is two very different things.

Katrina.

"The emperor has no clothes moment."

The day prices went to $3 was when the public woke up, and ever since then, demand has been flat, as idjuts started motorizing bikes and car-pooling began again, mass transit started adding more railcars, "green buses" started selling.

And shoppers cut their trips in half.

So, as prices start rising, point the finger where the guilty parties are. It no longer is a price=demand equation.

Chaos equals profit, and if you don't fall for the b.s., the same crooks from the 1970's, 80's, 90's and 00's will try the same games.

But it won't work this time.

 

[SimpleSimon]

I wish I had your trust in people learning anything, 'bama. I don't.

It will work, and the sheep will get sheared yet again. I've been watching this go on for nearly 40 years now. I got a "hardship license" when I was 14 years old, I owned 3 Dodge 4-door pickups with an 18 foot trailer full of tools behind each of them, and I bought a 1967 Impala Supersport with a 327 and a 6-pack. When I started driving gas was $.19/gallon, and very shortly went to $.50/gallon, and it has climbed in major surges interspersed with a steady base rise ever since.

When OPEC formed and the first "oil embargo" hit I was prepared - I had a 1,200 gallon above-ground tank completely full, and I never once waited in line for fuel - nor did my crews. I did put a chain link fence with a heavy locked gate around the fueling station down by the barn.

Gasoline/oil pricing is an immense vehicle for its drivers to rob the world with.

 

[bamabikeguy]

When OPEC formed and the first "oil embargo" hit I was prepared - I had a 1,200 gallon above-ground tank completely full, and I never once waited in line for fuel - nor did my crews. I did put a chain link fence with a heavy locked gate around the fueling station down by the barn.

Gasoline/oil pricing is an immense vehicle for its drivers to rob the world with.

I've been reading and listening for the "clue", and what I heard from 3 analysts yesterday made cents.

Since last September OPEC has cut "per day" production three times, and now they've hit the target, $60 a barrel.

That is the price where they start making real money, a lot more than if they pumped more barrels at $40-50. They WANT $100, but that's where rumors and fears start kicking in. Hurricanes, saber rattling and chaos will give them all windfall profits.

So, the price at the gallon today should be the basement. The shale pits in Canada and deepest offshore drilling don't make money until $100 per barrel becomes fact.

BUT, the analysts also said, the U.S. MUST stays on the current trend, lowering usage by about 4% per year, to keep consumers in the driver's seat with "demand", because some of the small and medium OPEC suppliers are in bigger financial binds, keep deferring balloon payments because you can't foreclose on an entire country.

If the U.S. really sobered up, petrowise, and cut usage by 10% in a single year, OPEC might have to break up because banks will call in the notes.

None of the analysts mentioned MBers, but since the majority of car trips are less than 10 miles, you are going to start getting more and more inquiries from strangers.

We can't drive the prices lower, but we can help keep $100 a barrel ($3.50 a gallon) just an occasional event.

 

[bamabikeguy]

Your mass transit is light years ahead of ours, and I wouldn't mind $4, if the windfall was split with alternative energy programs.

Our problem is distances, diesel to bring goods to markets will remain a constant. They get the big trucks near 10 mpg, then EPA comes along requires a device that drags them back down to 8. Diesel m.p.g. performance in our 18 wheelers has actually declined since the 1970's.

The refinery explosion is just a once per spring coincidence, there was zero talk about gas prices when I posted that, now PRICES RISING is on the news every evening.

 

[bamabikeguy]

What's that littlest Ford they sell in Britain? The one hitting 70 m.p.g.?

Same model here only hits 40 mpg, due to Environmental Protection Requirements.

Now, something is really up with that, I can't believe GrBritain would allow spewing of fumes, while over here I don't understand how filtering could cause that much loss of performance.

 

[Happy Valley]

The Saudi oil minister yesterday said their target was $75bbl.

And Giles, while not everyone in the US drives a gas guzzling truck or SUV there are many on the road, most with one rider up and that same V8 in many parts of the world would only be powering a vehicle used to carry 20 or 30 people.

 

[bamabikeguy]

If I was dictator for a day, one of the first things I'd do is send 1,000 volunteers into the patent/trademark offices, and nationalize any of the Tesla-like miracle devices, AND rip out some of the robberies that Oil Companies have carried out for 70 years.....

In 1994, General Motors acquired a controlling interest in Ovonics's battery development and manufacture, including patents controlling the manufacture of large nickel metal hydride (NiMH) batteries. In 2001, Texaco purchased GM's share in GM Ovonics. A few months later, Chevron acquired Texaco. In 2003, Texaco Ovonics Battery Systems was restructured into Cobasys, a 50/50 joint venture between Chevron and Energy Conversion Devices (ECD) Ovonics.[4] Chevron's influence over Cobasys extends beyond a strict 50/50 joint venture. Chevron held a 19.99% interest in ECD Ovonics as of a public filing made January 15, 2003.[5] In a later filing on May 17, 2005[6], Energy Conversion Devices announced that they had exercised an option to purchase back 4,376,633 shares of stock from a Chevron Subsidiary, and would cancel and return them to authorized-unissued status. This is the exact number of shares that was listed as owned by ChevronTexaco in the January 15, 2003 filing.

At least I'd find out if the ultra-carburation system really was stolen by Standard Oil.

 

[bamabikeguy]

Boom #2- adds at least another dime, I betcha !!

Moments ago:

http://www.thisdayonline.com/nview.php?id=144358

The onslaught by the Joint Task Force (JTF) against militants in the Niger Delta has entered its 14th day with a new twist: the militants have blown up an oil facility belonging to United States oil giant, Chevron.

Yesterday, JTF confirmed that suspected militants attacked Chevron pipeline in Abiteye in Warri South-west Local Government area of Delta State.
The task force blamed the incident on "Kingsley Opuye and his group of militants" operating mainly in the Delta and Ondo axis of the Niger Delta.

Also confirming the incident, Chevron said one of its pipelines in the Abiteye area of the state was breached on Sunday following militant attack apparently in response to the military offensive by JTF.

In its first official reaction since the escalation of hostilities in the Niger Delta, the oil major said it had shut in 100,000 barrels per day of crude oil as a precautionary measure to ensure the protection of people and the environment.

Claiming responsibility for the attack, however, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), the main militant group in the oil-rich region, said in an email to journalists that it had sabotaged pipelines to flow stations at Alero Creek, Otunana, Abiteye, Makaraba and Dibi feeding a Chevron facility.

The group warned such attacks would continue.
"We will continue our cat-and-mouse tactics with (the military) until oil exports cease completely," it said.

The irony is Chevron will make MORE money with 100,000 bbl. per day less on the market, that is petro-nomics !!