Whee, $5/gallon

[ChadTower]

They're already preparing people for the next level of gouging.

[Dartful Dodger]

This shouldn't be happening, we just took over a small country full of oil.

If there's not enough oil in Iraq to feed us, we should just go into Iran.  We'll need a new cover story though, the masses wont buy WMD again.  Although it didn't take them long to forget about the towers ...and the news has been reporting Iran developing nuclear power....


We need to stop Iran from developing WMD, and we need to do it now, my car is at half a tank of gas.

[mr.Curmudgeon]

You act like you are joking, but you are not.


mrC

[Crazy Cooter]

If we invade Iran, it will destroy Iraq.  Iraqs banking system is dependent on Iran.  Then we'll have another country that is a mess besides Afghanistan, Iraq, and the US.

Just fill your tank from the neighbors cars for a few days.

[mr.Curmudgeon]

Again, I ask when the heroic Dartful Dodger plans on fighting in any of these wars? Or is he just going to sit comfortably behind his keyboard, pontificating, while other people die... just so he can get cheap gas?

[DYNAGOD]

[Dartful Dodger]

My desk isn't that comfortable.

[paigeoliver]

I love the Mad Max movies, unfortunately "The Road Warrior" is massively implausible. A bunch of guys with no gas driving around out in the desert in big V8s  looking for gas. The situation of the biker gangs wouldn't have been sustainable for more than a few days.

The other two are much more plausible.

[Sephroth57]

::wonders if he should download mad max:: ... crazy 80s movies

although i gotta say, they dont make movies like they used to.. whether or not thats a good thing i dunno but conan the destroyer wins for life!!

[paigeoliver]

And REALLY don't the people who write those articles buy gasoline?

All it takes is one schmuck to write an article for a major news outlet claiming gasoline with hit price-X because of "temporary situation Y" and BOOM it happens.

If things continue along like they are now then I will be moving to one of the highrise apartments downtown, getting a job downtown, and not driving at all. Biggest thing stopping me is that I don't want to try to make new friends (or look for a new job).

[Zakk]

Gas just hit $2.00 a litre here.

[paigeoliver]

Gas just hit $2.00 a litre here.  That's about $7.58 a US gallon.  The hurricane hasn't even hit anything yet!  Oh, but I'm sure we're not getting gouged or anything, oh no. 

Yes, but everyplace with gasoline prices like that get public services that dwarf those in America.

[jbox]

Yes, but everyplace with gasoline prices like that get public services that dwarf those in America.

Nah, those services are free. 

[danny_galaga]

Gas just hit $2.00 a litre here.  That's about $7.58 a US gallon.  The hurricane hasn't even hit anything yet!  Oh, but I'm sure we're not getting gouged or anything, oh no. 

cool! where are you? thats more than in australia! 

[ChadTower]

And REALLY don't the people who write those articles buy gasoline?

No, the people that write those articles SELL gasoline.

If things continue along like they are now then I will be moving to one of the highrise apartments downtown, getting a job downtown, and not driving at all. Biggest thing stopping me is that I don't want to try to make new friends (or look for a new job).

Funny, I was just saying in another thread people could do this sort of thing to avoid buying gasoline.  Other folks were all of the opinion that it wasn't possible, that society as a whole had to change before someone could stop buying gas.

[Thenasty]

yey!!!! Lets do MAMBO # 5  who's next after RITA ?

[ChadTower]

I thought they were supposed to be alphabetical?  How did it go from K to R?

[abrannan]

I thought they were supposed to be alphabetical?  How did it go from K to R?

Well, Ophelia sat over NC's Outer Banks for a few days.  Most of the others turned north into the atlantic well before they got to land.
Remaining names for 2005:

Stan
Tammy
Vince
Wilma

After that, it goes to the Greek alphabet
http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/aboutnames.shtml







As for the Gas Situation and Iraq.  Crude oil supply isn't the problem, it's refining capacity.  We've got plenty of crude, even before OPEC upped production.  Our problem is that the gas companies have been shutting down refineries over the past several years due to high production costs.  Unfortunately, they're not something you can bring back online overnight.  So when the hurricane shuts down the refineries along the gulf coast, that hits a significant portion of our refining capacity.  Eggs all in one basket, anyone?

[ChadTower]

So, with that in mind, why do we have a strategic crude reserve but not a strategic refined reserve?

[abrannan]

Flexibility.  You can turn crude into any of a number of petroleum products as needed, but once it's refined, you've locked yourself into one product.  If it were a heating oil shortage, and our reserves had all already been refined to gasoline, we'd be up a creek, freezing our butts off.

The problem is the same as what led to NO being flooded.  Inadequate risk analysis being performed on our infrastructure.  Yes, having refining capacity at the mouth of the Mississippi river allows us to distribute the gasoline all throughout the middle United States, but putting too large a percentage of our refining capacity in one geographic area leaves us vulnerable to a natural disaster. 

[ChadTower]

Flexibility.

[missioncontrol]

I just got gas (because my truck was on E)for $2.65 same as pre-Katrina but I did notice on the way home a few stations had allready bumped back up to $2.99 there were more people than usuall getting gas but no massive gas lines yet.....


Everybody relax get gas when you usually do and tell your friends and family the same.

[abrannan]

I just got gas (because my truck was on E)

Brilliant!  Running vehicles on Ecstasy! 

[Thenasty]

Everybody relax get gas when you usually do and tell your friends and family the same.

I told everyone, when they have to make GAS, aim for my gastank 

Right now, where I am, its @ 2.80, thats the cheapest I've around. It was $3.45 at some point a week or 2 ago..

[Stingray]

Still one station near where I live that has it for $2.43, everywhere else is about $2.60ish.

-S

[Sephroth57]

im not really one to go to a different gas station if i know its .10 cheaper then the one im driving by. whats it saving me,  1$? its not worth the time/effort to drive over to a different place

[DrewKaree]

I told everyone, when they have to make GAS, aim for my gastank 

.....snags the title for today of "worst joke posted on the forum"

Chad, if they had BOTH types of strategic reserves, then we'd be hearing everyone question why we don't have a heating oil strategic reserve, a diesel strategic reserve, a kerosene strategic reserve......there's simply no end to the reserves our government "should" be...um....reserving.

Whatever happened to the car that ran on puppies, kittens, and baby seals?

[ChadTower]

Chad, if they had BOTH types of strategic reserves, then we'd be hearing everyone question why we don't have a heating oil strategic reserve, a diesel strategic reserve, a kerosene strategic reserve......there's simply no end to the reserves our government "should" be...um....reserving.

People can scream for those things all they want, but we both know that a refined gasoline reserve would be a strong strategic move.  And who says that having smaller reserves of other types of fuel is a bad thing?  If the government can take another country on a whim, build a billion dollar, impenetrable city sized bunker in a mountain for its leaders and then abandon it, we should be able to keep a few hundred thousand gallons of kerosene in the middle of Nevada.

[abrannan]

How large a strategic reserve of gas do you want?  The 2005 numbers for Ohio (first report I could find) http://www.house.gov/strickland/2005GasReportFinal.htm indicate about 465 million gallons per month.  Multiply that by 50, and for a one month national supply, you're talking roughly 9 billlion gallons of gasoline.   Find a place in this NIMBY world of ours that will accept  having 9 billion gallons of highly volatile fuel stored.  Find a politician who can answer and weather the constant barrage of criticism (OMG! Gas prices have gone up 10 cents this week! Why aren't we tapping into the reserve to relieve the burden on consumers!  You're in the pocket of big oil!  Ooh!  Have you seen the new H3?)

What we need is Federally mandated strategic refining capacity.  Oil companies must be able to maintain, regardless of disaster, a minimum level of refining capacity.  If that means paying some upkeep on inactive, but usable, refineries, then work out some level of burden sharing between the government and the oil producers. 

[ChadTower]

[Sephroth57]

that, plus underground storage

[ChadTower]

Well, yeah, you would build your strategic reserve underground in the desert of Nevada.  It wouldn't do much good to have billions of gallons of combustible liquid in the desert sun 24/7.

[Stingray]

The sun in Nevada stays out 24 hours a day? No wonder it's so hot there.

-S

[danny_galaga]

Flexibility.

[Crazy Cooter]

  Find a place in this NIMBY world of ours that will accept  having 9 billion gallons of highly volatile fuel stored.

There are places, like the deserts in Arizona and Nevada, where it could be 75 miles from the nearest place that anyone gives a crap about.

Our burned up plutonium is being buried out there.

You have to ask yourself: if you were a refinery, why would you up production?  You're making record profits right now.  I wouldn't change a thing (as a refiner).  I'd wait for federal grants.  Why spend your money when someone will give some to you for free?

[ChadTower]

If I were the Secretary of Defense, I would ask myself:

What would happen if the flow of gasoline in the US were completely interrupted?  Would our military be crippled?  Would we be able to adequately defend ourself, or sustain our economy?

A refinery would sell a billion gallons to the gov't.

[deadmoney5]

We can double the power of computers every year...we can clone animals...we can go the moon and back easily...we can do things medically that can blow your mind......

yet...cars still run on gasoline

I think if someone was just about to come up with an alternative to gas, that person would be silently killed...

it's all a conspiracy

[missioncontrol]

The gas stations have come up with a new way to raise the prices in our area:


After Katrina we went through gas lines and stations running out of gas.

here's what the stations are doing now:

They are placing bags over a few pumps and then raising the prices to make it appear that they are running out of gas just to scare the consumer into filling up their tanks.

If I'm not mistaking wouldn't all the pumps for each grade of fuel come out of the same underground tanks...It shouldn't be well this pump is out of 87 octane but that other one has it and that pump is out of 89 octane but that other one beside it has some...

[Crazy Cooter]

They are placing bags over a few pumps and then raising the prices to make it appear that they are running out of gas just to scare the consumer into filling up their tanks.

There was a station that got busted doing that.  I don't have a link for the story though.

[missioncontrol]

hmmmmmmm, so I wonder where the best place to report this activity would be.