Germany blames U.S. for oil spike, urges action

Reuters ^ | 8/31/05 | Reuters

[SevenDaysInMay]

Perhaps we should buy all the world's oil, because we can.

[alligator]

Well said. The guy is an arogant idiot.

[ordinaryguy]

I don't know. It wouldn't surprise me. The US requires certain gasoline formulations for environmental reasons, and not many nations currently produce those products. If they decided to target our market, they certainly could, however.

It would be very risky on our part to rely on such an arrangement. But, like I said, it wouldn't surprise me to see more of that in the future.

[Pearls Before Swine]

The lack of US refineries is causing gas and jet fuel shortages, but I don't see how it impacts the demand for oil. If anything, it would lessen US demand because the US can't refine much more than it gets.

[Revel]

Speculation has to be the key. We should outlaw it. I hear we did not have this nonsense in the 70's and it was much better.

I will never understand how the price of a barrow of Raw crude oil can go up when the US is not buying it to refine at the refinerys that are down. From the world market view... Demand is decreasing so the price on the world market for crude should go down.

[Paleo Conservative]

The lack of US refineries is causing gas and jet fuel shortages, but I don't see how it impacts the demand for oil. If anything, it would lessen US demand because the US can't refine much more than it gets.

It doesn't affect the demand; it affects the supply. The quantity demanded is greater than quantity supplied. If there are price controls on gasoline and other petroleum products, there will be queues just as there were in the 1970's. The Soviet Union prided itself back in the 1970's as not having inflation. Sure, the official prices of goods didn't increase, but if one wanted to buy something it wasn't enough to go to a store and present money. There were not enough consumer goods to go around. Instead of allowing prices to rise to put them in equilibrium they had queues for just about everything.

[ordinaryguy]

And the higher gas prices should reduce demand as well.

[Paleo Conservative]

Speculation has to be the key. We should outlaw it. I hear we did not have this nonsense in the 70's and it was much better.

Are you a total idiot or do you just play one on the internet. In the 70's it was much worse. We had long lines precisely because there were prices controls. Limits on domestic prices stunted domestic exploration while below world market prices encourage consumption of more oil that at the margin came from overseas. Higher prices discourage consumption while they encourage more production.

[ordinaryguy]

What pearls was saying was that we don't have enough refinery capacity to turn more oil into gas, therefore, we aren't using as much oil as we otherwise might. Insufficient US refinery capacity does not put upward pressure on the worldwide cost of oil. Only on US gas prices.

[Auntie Dem]

...and Louisville Sluggers. Bullets are too valuable.

Nahhh...all you gotta do is get the econazis and their lawyers to stand in a line. One fmj bullet will go through 3 or 4 of them easy. Maybe more, since their skulls are empty.

[Paleo Conservative]

What pearls was saying was that we don't have enough refinery capacity to turn more oil into gas, therefore, we aren't using as much oil as we otherwise might. Insufficient US refinery capacity does not put upward pressure on the worldwide cost of oil. Only on US gas prices.

It puts world wide pressure on refined products. Higher product prices in the US encourage suppliers to divert shipments of refined products. What pearls was not taking into account is that it is not just a problem with a shortage of refining capacity in the US, ther has been a decrease in the supply of crude oil available in the US. About a quarter of all the domestic crude oil production comes from offshore wells in the Gulf of Mexico. Over 95% of that production was shut in to prevent blowouts and environmental catasrophy.

Considering that Katrina was a category 5 hurricane while it was offshore and affecting offshore oil platforms, I think the oil industry did a damned good job preparing for this hurricane. I haven't heard anything about massive oil spills in the Gulf of Mexico since Katina hit. Have you? I guarantee you if there were any oil spills, Green Peace and other environmental groups would be screaming right now.

The wells are still shut in, due to the need to have divers inspect the wells and pipelines. The decrease in production in the Gulf of Mexico has created a supply shock that has decreased the ability of the industry world wide to meet demand for crude oil due to tight supplies. Oil is traded in a world wide market. It's price is going up world wide.

[SunkenCiv]

Too bad Germany didn't manage to resist a little longer. In retrospect, good place to drop the Big One first.

---

"The American president has closed his eyes to the economic and human damage that natural catastrophes such as Katrina -- in other words, disasters caused by a lack of climate protection measures -- can visit on his country." Who wrote this? None other than Jürgen Trittin, Germany's minister of the environment... It's not the American people's fault that the storm hit and they couldn't have stopped it. The Germans, on the other hand, could have done a lot to prevent World War II. And yet, care packages still rained down from US troops. Trittin's know-it-all stance is therefore not only tasteless, it is also historically blind.

---

[ordinaryguy]

Clement's comments mentioned US refinery capacity. Pearls was commenting on that.

The US does not import much refined product. Foreign suppliers are not encouraged to divert shipments of refined product to the US, as very few refineries abroad even produce the gasoline formulations required by law in this country.

[ordinaryguy]

Katrina Damage to Offshore Oil Production

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1474600/posts

[SunkenCiv]

I paid $2.559 for gasoline yesterday. Katrina shut down one or two more refineries. The price around here today was north of $3 a gallon, generally speaking, about $3.179, and it wasn't the fault of "Big Oil" or the President. It isn't a conspiracy of oil companies. This is, in part, due to OPEC underperformance; partly due to a-holes from a number of Moslem countries who volunteer to sabotage and murder all over Iraq; partly due to rising demand, especially in China; partly due to the idiotic large number of gasoline "grades" required by the EPA (thanks to idiots in Congress years ago); partly due to the lack of backbone by the Congress in not imposing ever-higher fuel economy (and not CAFE standards, real standards to apply to all vehicles sold), and not permitting drilling the ANWR and for that matter everywhere on the North Slope.

Goldman sees oil price 'super spike' Crude could reach $105 a barrel
Market watch.com | March 31, 2005 | By Padraic Cassidy, MarketWatch
Posted on 03/31/2005 7:27:57 AM PST by aculeus
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1374595/posts

Goldman (Sachs)sees oil price 'super spike' to $105 a barrel
Yahoo News! | Thursday March 31, 05:58 PM
Posted on 03/31/2005 1:56:57 PM PST by nickcarraway
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1374898/posts

Investment Bank Sees Oil 'Super Spike' to $105
Marketwatch | 03/31/2005 | Padraic Cassidy
Posted on 03/31/2005 2:44:04 PM PST by Hawk44
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1374939/posts

Oil Soars to Record on Spike Alert (Goldman Sachs specs $105 per barrel)
Reuters | Fri Apr 1, 2005 4:05 PM ET | Richard Valdmanis
Posted on 04/02/2005 9:09:59 AM PST by sully777
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1376091/posts

Oil: A Bubble, Not a Spike?
business week | April 27 | na
Posted on 04/27/2005 5:11:38 PM PDT by Flavius
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1392456/posts

Oil climbs above $60 on refinery fires ($60.27/bbl)
Reuters | July 29, 2005
Posted on 07/29/2005 2:00:41 AM PDT by RWR8189
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1452972/posts

US Fuel Prices Hit Highs Friday On New Refinery Problems
DOW JONES NEWSWIRES | 15 AUGUST 2005 | Beth Heinsohn and Leah McGrath Goodman
Posted on 08/17/2005 7:56:43 AM PDT by kellynla
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1465104/posts

Refinery fire could hike gas prices
Contra Costa Times | 8/25/5 | Rick Jurgens
Posted on 08/25/2005 12:47:45 PM PDT by SmithL
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1470683/posts

Gas prices spike to an all-time high
Mercury News | Wed, Aug. 31, 2005 | Kevin G. Hall
Posted on 08/31/2005 3:40:25 PM PDT by jb6
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1474373/posts

Poll: Oil spike blamed on Bush, big Oil
CNN
Posted on 08/31/2005 3:47:32 PM PDT by jmc1969
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1474379/posts

[SunnyD1182]

Just yesterday, I heard a German official blame the US' lackadaisical attitude toward global warming as the reason for the hurricane in the 1st place. Now, they want us to build even more refineries, which will further exacerbate the purported global warming problem?

I think they've been watching a little too much John Kerry.

[Paleo Conservative]

The US does not import much refined product. Foreign suppliers are not encouraged to divert shipments of refined product to the US, as very few refineries abroad even produce the gasoline formulations required by law in this country.

If there is a shortage in the US, prices will rise and encourage suppliers who otherwise would be shipping to other countries to divert product to the US. Gasoline isn't the only refined product. Also, Venezuela does ship quite a bit of refined gasoline to the US. It's the fault of clueless politician who campaign on the basis of slogans and photo ops for pushing their states to enact niche product reguations for their states. I bet there's a zero or even negative environmental benefit from those requirements. The ethanol requirement absolutely causes environmental degradation. It takes more energy to plant harvest, transport, and distill enthanol than is recovered from burning it as fuel. The extra acreage planted to produce grain for ethanol increases erosion and depletes topsoil.

[SunkenCiv]

Oil Prices Spike Amid Katrina Fears
August 29, 2005
By KOMO Staff & News Services
http://www.komotv.com/stories/38802.htm
http://www.davesdaily.com/out.php?id=8912&url=http://www.komotv.com/stories/38802.htm

[Paleo Conservative]

Thanks for posting that link. I was going to do it myself.

[SunkenCiv]

Ping!