Gasbaggery
By Libby
The NYT posts an long apology for the oil corporations' obscene profits. The Gun Toting Liberal has already interpreted the double speak nicely so I'll just reiterate the main point.
The refineries are breaking down because they delayed essential repairs in order to boost profits. They were able to do this because industrial safety compliance under the Bush adminstration is a bad joke. It's non-existent. Not only is this environmentally negligent, it's why you're paying so much at the gas pump.
And by the way, the most ridiculous premise put forward in the piece is that the poor oil companies would be producing more gas, if only they could. If they produced more gas, there wouldn't be a shortage and they couldn't charge the outrageous prices for it. Their biggest problem is figuring out where to draw the line between their ability to withhold the supply without triggering consumer adversion to the gouging.
The NYT posts an long apology for the oil corporations' obscene profits. The Gun Toting Liberal has already interpreted the double speak nicely so I'll just reiterate the main point.
The refineries are breaking down because they delayed essential repairs in order to boost profits. They were able to do this because industrial safety compliance under the Bush adminstration is a bad joke. It's non-existent. Not only is this environmentally negligent, it's why you're paying so much at the gas pump.
And by the way, the most ridiculous premise put forward in the piece is that the poor oil companies would be producing more gas, if only they could. If they produced more gas, there wouldn't be a shortage and they couldn't charge the outrageous prices for it. Their biggest problem is figuring out where to draw the line between their ability to withhold the supply without triggering consumer adversion to the gouging.
Labels: Corporatocracy, environment
posted by Libby Spencer at 2:30 PM
6 Comments:
Oh cmon, your prices are hardly aligned with those of Europe. You pay same for a liter/gallon of gas as I do, except our standard is about three fold lower than yours.
Me thinks Americans behave like a spoiled child on this issue.
I imagine it's hard to understand when you pay so much for petrol overseas but you must also remember that the tradeoff for refineries in our backyards is supposed to be cheap gas. The oil co's are gouging simply for profit and allowing their infrastructure to deterioate. That's the real issue, not the price.
"Meanwhile, refiners have been scrambling to meet a raft of environmental regulations, phase out toxic additives, add ethanol to the fuel mix and introduce new ultralow sulfur standards for gasoline and diesel. Industry insiders attribute much of the fragility of refining operations to the difficulty of making these cleaner fuels."
thanks alot al gore / green people
Refiners spent $9 billion from 2002 to 2006 to make low sulfur diesel. But producing these cleaner fuels means processing crude oil more intensely through the refining process, at higher pressures and temperatures. This, in turn, leads to more chances for glitches or breakdowns, refiners say.
"
thank
Well Lester, it's not like that happened yesterday. That's the refiners excuse for failing to upgrade the equipment to meet the requirements. They're shortchanging the infrastructure to pay the obscene bonuses for the top execs.
You can spin that any way you like but it's still just greed. What's so bloody bad about protecting the environment? Cheap gas won't mean shit if you can't leave your house because the air is unbreathable.
ethanol isn't going to make the air more breatheable
Yeah, the ethanol thing is kind of a pig in the poke. They need to come up with alternate fuels altogether and get away from fossil fuel.
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