Gasoline prices up 8.7 percent since refinery fire a month ago
By George Avalos
Oakland Tribunecontracostatimes.com
Posted: 09/04/2012 04:48:18 PM PDT
September 5, 2012 12:9 AM GMTUpdated: 09/04/2012 05:09:35 PM PDT

And look at today’s electric cars. The Leaf is as large as a Camry and uses no gas. The Chevy Volt runs all electric so, in theory, like the Leaf, it gets infinite mpg, but it uses some gas for extended trips. According to drivers who have written about it, they tend to get around 100 mpg.

The key for today’s electric cars is that they are not for vacations, but for daily commutes. A Leaf should average 75-100 miles per charge. How many us commute that far in a day? The Volt goes fewer miles but has the gas charger so you keep going. So you drive to work, come how, and plug it in, as you do your phone.
Give the industry some time to improve batteries (for longer life) and to set up recharging (or battery switching) stations and charging need be no worse than stopping for gas. But even in the near-future, having a household own one fuel efficient car and one not (for long trips) is pretty realistic. Give the industry 13 years and an average of 54 is quite realistic.

BTW, electric vehicles also can have more power than gas. They accelerate fast because they have no gears. (Think of turning on a blender–it does not need to go through the settings from slow to fast, but can start on high speed.) I think it was on the Tesla that had to be prevented from being able to go over 130 mph.

All-electric cars are not for everyone yet, but give them time. Think how much cell phones and other technology have improved in the last 13 years. Getting the “average” car up to 54 mpg in 13 years is pretty realistic. Get all cars up to 25 mpg and get a good percentage above 54 (all-electric, natural gas, fuel cell, and hybrids).

Call me old fashioned, but I like a car with enough power to get out of its own way, and some iron wrapped around me and my loved ones.

Old Honda 50′s use to get something like over 200 mpg in the late 60′s. Of course you could only go about 40 mph, but still. I miss the days of 26.9 cent gas.
Even adjusted for inflation, its under $2.00 a gallon.
However our air is indeed cleaner now, but about 90% of that is in the can, and NOT helped by the CARB and company gang.
You could dump all automobile smog checks and there would be a minimal reduction in air quality.
Perhaps 1% to 5% max. Probably about 2% worse.
Just my guess, but current smog checks are nothing but a money grab.

Obviously, the gas stations took immediate advantage of the situation. The rest is probably market traders pushing up the price. Same thing with the Hurricane Isaac.

Obama’s fault, no doubt.

As for useless, obsolete or ill-advised laws, regs and red tape in general, I’m with you on that. The business climate here is horrendous. I’ve only been here since ’04, but I’ve seen it all. And I have the benefit of having lived in several other states for comparison purposes. However, even though I’m no cheerleader for the bloated CARB, I wouldn’t put clean air in the “useless” bucket.

Just a example. You do admit we pay a premium. Everyone in the industry says that part of that premium is the lack of a competive market for our special blend, even when there isn’t a incident or a planned maintenance shutdown.

Even if the cost of our special blend is only 10 cents per gallon, that still works out to a 1.5 billion dollar penalty each year. By way of comparison, that is far more than the expected savings of Browns new pension reform.

You seem intent on minimizing the impact, of which I know of no expert who doesn’t indicate the extra cost for our unique blend is very real.
And the expert opinion that our unique blend does NOT make our air cleaner compared to the blends found elsewhere in the USA.
It has created a artificial market. Limited supplies.

So many little penalties for living in California and for making it a pleasant place for business.
You’ve been here only 8 years. From 2006.
You have no idea of how this law or so many other useless laws have altered the economic environmentment we once had. Death by a thousand cuts. Each put in place to placate some special interest.

As I indicated, prior to messing up our gasoline markets, we had tens of thousands of independent dealers. Eventually the new laws drove 98% of them out of the market, leaving us with no effective competition. This was all done by design, with the complicity of “environmental” groups who claim to be against the interests of Big Oil.

You may be right about all that. But, honestly, I’ve been here for eight years and kept an eye on the difference between the Bay Area and the national average during all seasons, refinery shutdowns, supply shortages and surpluses etc. Through all of those things, the difference seems to be rather consistent. Whatever problems the blend created in the past, they don’t seem to now. Logically, if the blend were the problem, you would expect to see more price differential volatility. The fact that the differential remains consistent suggests to me that higher general costs and gasoline taxes, which are constant, are the real factor at work. Not saying we shouldn’t go with the same mix as everywhere else. However, I don’t see where there would be a noticeable economic gain from that.