Gas prices in 2012? At least $4?

[jamesqf]

Originally Posted by suspectnumber961

U.S. demand for oil and refined products — including gasoline — is down sharply from last year, so much that the United States has become a net exporter of gasoline, unable to consume all it makes.

I think this might be an instance of lying by telling the exact truth, just not all of it. Note that there is a difference between gasoline, a finished product, and oil, the raw material from which gasoline is made. Making gasoline from oil requires large, complex, expensive oil refineries, which the US built back when it had plenty of domestic oil. So as the domestic oil supply decreased, the US imported oil to keep the refineries working, and exported some of the refined products.

And in fact, it seems that (up to 2007, the latest data I can find in a quick search), the US has been exporting a lot of gasoline for decades: United States Motor Gasoline Exports by Year (Thousand Barrels per Day)

[suspectnumber961]

How I Dismantled the World


In October Sandia National Laboratories engineer Phil Hoover dismantled the U.S. arsenal’s last B53, a 9-megaton bomb 600 times as powerful as the one dropped on Hiroshima. Hoover talked to DISCOVER about taking apart America’s most powerful weapon.

The B53 was big and heavy, about the size of a minivan and 10,000 pounds. We needed 130 engineers and scientists from across the nuclear weapons enterprise to take it apart. Even though the B53 was designed to be rather easily disassembled, it still took us about two weeks per bomb.

All of the nuclear explosive disassembly was done in one well-lit, clean, and orderly room large enough to hold a Volkswagen van. We wore cover*alls, safety glasses, gloves, safety shoes, and dosimeters to track radiation exposure. Typically three or four people at a time actually did the work. There wasn’t much small talk—the operation required focus.



....

Nothing to worry about now.....relax...go about your business....

[redpoint5]

Originally Posted by suspectnumber961

How I Dismantled the World

Nothing to worry about now.....relax...go about your business....

What has this to do with any of the previous topics?

This sounds more like a comedy piece than anything particularly informative. Nuclear bombs are extremely precise instruments, and if anything is even slightly damaged the thing is likely to be rendered disabled.

[suspectnumber961]

Because discussing issues and politics at this level is actually a clown and comedy show? Like a pack of street dogs scrapping over a piece of gristle....? While the real decisions are made elsewhere?

...............

Market Deja Vu? The Price of Gasoline Begins To Surge Out Of Control Again (NYSEArca:USO, NYSEArca:XLE, NYSEArca:UGA, NYSE:XOM, NYSE:CVX) | ETF DAILY NEWS

The price of gas is going even higher even though energy consumption is sharply declining in the United States. Just check out the charts in this article by Charles Hugh Smith. Americans are using less gasoline and less energy and yet the price of gas continues to go up.

That is not a good sign.

Certainly any decrease that we are seeing in the U.S. is being more than offset by rising demand in places such as China and India. As emerging economies all over the globe continue to develop this is going to continue to put pressure on gas prices.

So just how bad are gas prices in the U.S. right now?

Just consider the following facts….

-The average price of a gallon of gasoline in the United States is now $3.53.

-The average price of a gallon of gasoline is already higher than $3.70 in Connecticut, Washington D.C. and New York.

-In California, the average price of a gallon of gasoline is $3.96 and there are quite a few cities where it is now above 4 dollars.

-In mid-January 2009, the average price of a gallon of gasoline in the United States was just $1.85.

-The average price of a gallon of gasoline in the United States has risen 25 cents since the beginning of 2012.

-Never before in U.S. history has the price of gasoline been this high so early in the year.

-The Oil Price Information Service is projecting that the price of gas could reach an average of $4.25 a gallon by the end of April.

-The price of oil just keeps going up. The price for West Texas Intermediate is about 19 percent higher than it was one year ago.

-The price of gasoline is also reaching record highs in many areas of Europe as well. For example, the price of diesel fuel in the UK recently set a brand new record.

-In 2011, U.S. households spent a whopping 8.4% of their incomes on gasoline. That percentage has approximately doubled over the past ten years.

But the price of gas is not the only thing making driving much more expensive these days.

All over the country, our politicians have been putting up toll booths. Most of the time these toll booths are going up on roads that have already been paid for.

[jamesqf]

You should keep in mind that the supply of oil depends on the price, which in turn depends on the cost of getting it out of the ground and to the refinery. There's oil in the ground that might cost $50/bbl to get, there's more that costs $75, $100, $150... If the price of gas isn't high enough to cover the cost of getting the oil out, it'll stay in the ground.

So what happens (added to all the other factors like Middle East problems, increasing demand from developing economies, etc.) is that the price of oil goes up, the costly wells start pumping, that increases supply, the price goes down, the wells stop pumping... and repeat, with the price rachetting a bit higher each time.

[NeilBlanchard]

The price here is up 11 cents / gallon in just over a week, to $3.669.

[NachtRitter]

Just paid $4.299/g for B20, which surprisingly was cheaper than regular gasoline at $4.399/g ... first time in a long time I've seen that! Premium gasoline was $4.699/g!!

[jamesqf]

Originally Posted by suspectnumber961

-In 2011, U.S. households spent a whopping 8.4% of their incomes on gasoline. That percentage has approximately doubled over the past ten years.

I filled up the Insight the other day for about $35. That'll take me more than 700 miles, and last a month or two. Now if that was 8.4% of my income, I'd be making a bit over $400/month - and my actual income has at least another zero on the end.

So why are so many Americans still paying such a large fraction of their incomes for gas? Surely anyone but the terminally ignorant has seen this coming for years - decades if you go back to the Arab oil embargo of the '70s. Is it just that they refuse to deal with reality? And if so, why should I sympathize?

[redpoint5]

Just saw $4 at a Shell station tonight, and just across the street at Arco it was $3.80. No idea why anyone buys fuel at Shell.

Originally Posted by jamesqf

So why are so many Americans still paying such a large fraction of their incomes for gas? Surely anyone but the terminally ignorant has seen this coming for years - decades if you go back to the Arab oil embargo of the '70s. Is it just that they refuse to deal with reality? And if so, why should I sympathize?

People are not entirely rational beings, and Americans in particular have certain weaknesses, chief among them being vanity. We are all about image. A Hummer thundering down the road projects a certain image of wealth and power (it projects a different image to those of us in the know).

When have people ever been forward thinking? We tend to live for the moment- tomorrow be damned. We have children before establishing a solid relationship, we buy on credit and fail to understand how wicked compounding interest is, we see home values rising at 8% per year and expect that to continue forever... the list of absurdities goes on. Heck, I just stayed out until 2am last Thursday knowing Friday would be hell, but I did it anyhow.

It's a miracle people as foolish as ourselves can live such extravagant lives. As for why you should sympathize- I would simply because I too have failed to live an entirely rational life and would hope people are mature enough to pity the foolish decisions I have made.

[Ladogaboy]

I don't know what ARCO does to their gas, but I stay away at this point. Even when I wasn't paying that close of attention to my mileage, I noticed a huge difference in fuel economy between ARCO and other gas. ~ 10% difference, IIRC.