DrumBeat: April 19, 2008
Posted by Leanan on April 19, 2008 - 9:38am
Topic: Miscellaneous
Nothing stopping oil prices from rising: IEA
ROME (Rome) - Record oil of $117 a barrel calls for a demand response and a supply response, but for now there is little to stop prices heading still higher, the deputy executive director of the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Saturday."We need both a demand response and a supply response," said William Ramsay on arrival in Rome for talks between energy producers and consumers.
"I certainly hope we'll start to get a demand response ... that's greater efficiencies and all those things we have talked about."
Avalanches spark massive power shortage in Alaskan capital
Several massive avalanches have damaged hydroelectric power lines near Juneau, Alaska, knocking out 85 per cent of the city's electricity and likely causing utility prices to soar....The damage is extensive and the danger of more avalanches is still high, said Gail Wood, spokeswoman for Alaska Electric Light and Power.
She said it may be three weeks before crews can get to the downed lines and it will probably take at least two months before the lines can be repaired.
Wood added power rates in Juneau could triple because the city will have to rely on diesel generators.
She estimated Juneau could burn 400,000 litres of diesel fuel a day to make up for the loss of the hydro power.
Gas prices soar; no slowdown in sight
“The price of gas is not high because there is any shortage of it. In fact, there is a surplus of gas. ... We are running out of places to put it,” said Bill Day, a spokesman for Valero Energy Corp., which runs two refineries in California.“Gas is high because the price of crude oil is high,” Day said. “Consumers think there is someone pulling the strings and setting prices, but it's the marketplace that sets the price. It is very, very unusual for oil to be as expensive as it is, and the dollar to be as low.”
Pain at the pump before going to the polls
Energy prices are "killing us," says Jim Roberts, a 60-year-old Democrat. "I could work three jobs and still have a problem with paying for my heat and my gas."Voters' pain and outrage notwithstanding -- even in an election year -- it's probably folly to expect short-term fixes from Washington. But if it's far-sighted strategy that consumers in Pennsylvania -- and elsewhere -- are seeking, this seems to be their lucky year. And in a state that's so closely split between Republicans and Democrats, a candidate's message about energy could help tip the balance between Pennsylvania going red or blue in November.
Parking is a fundamental part of solving the congestion equation – if people cannot conveniently access new transit, Ontario might as well spend the $18 billion it plans for trains and buses on road widenings and asthma inhalers.But transit improvements also make parking more expensive because better transit inflates land values. So a growing number of planners are looking at alternatives – even the elimination of free parking at transit terminals.
Pennsylvania taxes, transport costs give N.J. a big price edge
Here's a shocker. Demand for fuel is down. A new report shows demand dropping on a national level, alongside rising fuel prices. People are apparently driving less.But the price of fuel is up. What ever happened to supply and demand?
Mexico's Calderon pushes plan to reform Pemex
LOS ANGELES (MarketWatch) -- Heated debate among Mexico's lawmakers about whether to open the door to foreign oil companies has stalled legislation aimed at reviving the flagging fortunes of state-run Petroleos de Mexico, the world's third-largest oil producer.The outcome is being watched closely across the border, especially by U.S. refiners anxiously looking for signs that Mexico can still be counted on as one of their main sources of crude.
Oil Bill Protest Shuts Mexican Congress
MEXICO CITY — The scene inside the lower house of Congress here on Friday morning resembled a college political rally more than a legislative chamber. A giant tarp dragged over the dais was painted with the word “CLOSED.”Chairs blockaded entrances to the stage. Signs draped over the desks of congressional leaders called for a “national debate” on overhauling the state’s ailing oil monopoly, Petróleos Mexicanos, or Pemex for short. A group of left-leaning lawmakers in hard hats waved Mexican flags while the chairman of the energy committee, Alejandro Sánchez Comacho, chanted into a bullhorn.
“You don’t sell Pemex,” he shouted. “You defend Pemex.”
Paraguay Chooses Between Firsts
Lugo sees the electricity deals as one solution. Rising demand has created an energy crisis in South America, especially in growing economies like Brazil; and Paraguay's hydro-electric dams on the Parana River provide one of the nation's most valuable commodities (and almost two-thirds of its GDP). The market value of the electricity Paraguay sells to Brazil and Argentina each year is estimated to be more than $3 billion; but Paraguay receives less than $1 billion for it. Lugo wants to renegotiate that arrangement, and many if not most Paraguayans back him. "We've been robbed by our neighbors for far too long," says Luisa Guillen, a market stall owner in the capital, Asuncion. "It's time Paraguay stood up for itself, and I think Lugo's the only candidate who realizes that."
Persian Gulf Tanker Rates May Rise on Restocking, Record Fuel
(Bloomberg) -- The cost of shipping Middle East oil to Asia, the world's busiest route for supertankers, may rise for a seventh day on record refueling prices and as refineries hire tankers to replenish oil stockpiles.
Maine: Gasification plant bill signed into law
Gov. John Baldacci signed a law Tuesday that paves the way for adoption of the nation's first limits on carbon dioxide emissions from coal gasification power plants and refineries. The new law also imposes a three-year moratorium on licensing of such plants until the new regulations are developed.
Innovation, the Silver Bullet for all our Problems
High food prices, environmental damage, obesity, government waste, and even world hunger are being laid at the feet of farmers. While most of these accusations are untrue and based on misinformation or faulty science, nevertheless many of the problems of today are being, in some way, tied to agriculture. Do we have an answer? You bet, and it is the same answer farmers and agribusinesses have used for the past century to solve some mighty monumental challenges. The one thing that will meet the challenges of the present and the future is the same thing we have used to solve the problems of the past -- innovation.
Food, land crisis linked to environmental degradation
The Executive Secretary of the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) Luc Gnacadja warned Friday that the current food security crisis needs to be examined in line with the environmental change such as desertification, land degradation and drought (DLDD).
India most energy efficient among emerging economies
NEW DELHI: Defying the logic that a growing economy consumes more energy, India has emerged as the most energy efficient country among leading emerging nations including China, Brazil and South Africa.
Thinking out loud: "is free money a blessing or a curse?"
Suppose there's a person who lives an ordinary life (like most people) in the sense that they have a regular job, pay regular bills, and enjoy their free time without doing anything lavish. Now, suppose this person suddenly inherits or wins a large sum of money, say, 5 million dollars. This is seen as a good thing by the person receiving the money, and mostly everyone else (it's legal after all). But is getting this money a blessing or a curse? Could an inheritance or jackpot like that make a person lazy, and more importantly, dependent on money which they didn't have before and have no ability to create?Here's another scenario that's more realistic: think of oil-producing countries. These are nations that have done nothing to create their main source of wealth: crude oil that is sitting underground within established borders. These nations are basically a group of people who at some point in history learned they happened to be occupying a geographical location that for some reason contains crude oil, which is basically "free energy".
Chevy Volt is no "electric Camaro"
The concept version unveiled at the 2007 Detroit Auto Show looked nothing like the high-tech, fuel efficient cars consumers were used to seeing. With its sharp angles, long hood, and wheels out at the corners of the body, the Volt concept looked like a futuristic performance car, not a high-efficiency people mover.Inside GM, it was referred to as the "electric Camaro," said Boniface.
But there's a reason that fuel efficient cars don't look aggressive. A flat front end and sharp front corners are bad for air flow. The production car will have a rounded nose and tapered corners, while still retaining key styling elements of the concept car.
Kunstler: Farewell to suburbia
The fog of cluelessness that hangs over North America about the gathering global oil crisis and its ramifications seems to thicken by the hour. One reason for all the fog is that the key part of the story is so broadly misunderstood -- namely, that it's not about running out of oil; it's about how the complex systems we depend on for everyday life begin to destabilize as the global demand for oil starts to outstrip the supply.
New Urbanism means making the automobile less necessary
The problem: People living in low-density areas far from a city centre rely more on their cars. The solution: The New Urbanism Movement.New Urbanism is a fancy term describing a growing interest in urban landscapes designed to make car use less necessary.
The goal is to reconfigure North American cities to accommodate a more European lifestyle where everyone lives, shops and entertains themselves close to home.
Gas averaging more than $1.20 a litre across Canada
New Democrat finance critic Judy Wasylycia-Leis, agreed it will be a prime topic for discussion while Parliament takes a break next week."I think they're going to be pretty upset their price of gas keeps going up at the same time the government is giving another $1.5 billion in subsidies to the oil sands, to the big gas companies, the big developers, and yet nothing is being done to protect consumers," she told Mike Duffy Live.
Energy challenges also create opportunities
Many of us have read about the concept of "peak oil." U.S. oil production peaked in 1970 and world oil production seems to have peaked at the end of 2006. Every one of us is now experiencing its effects. Similarly, U.S. natural gas production has peaked and is going through depletion. As a result, natural gas prices have tripled in the last decade.What has not been discussed until very recently is the fact that the coal industry cannot keep pace with worldwide demand, nor can it handle future energy needs.
Scientist: Get involved for Earth Day
You can change a light bulb or plant a tree to help save the planet.But to really be a good steward for Earth Day, get involved, said James Hansen, NASA's leading climate scientist who was in Reno this week to accept the Desert Research Institute's annual Nevada Medal award.
"The most important thing is to affect political process," said Hansen, the scientist featured on "60 Minutes" who complained that the Bush Administration edited his reports to make global warming seem less threatening.
Canada's Arctic mapping key to resource claims
OTTAWA - Mapping the outer limits of Canada's continental shelves in the Arctic is essential in order to allow the country to control oil and mineral exploration in a responsible way, Natural Resources Minister Gary Lunn said Friday.After returning from a trip to the polar cap where he visited a northern Canadian research outpost, Lunn said he was confident that scientists would finish their work on schedule by 2013, allowing Canada to stake its claim to controlling development near the North Pole.
Canada: Carbon tax won't park drivers
A carbon tax likely won't persuade people to conserve gas, according to new figures from Statistics Canada that show the rising price of oil hasn't compelled drivers to cut their consumption.Nationally, gas prices rose 7.9% between March 2007 and March 2008, but Canadians spent 11.3% more at the pumps last year compared to 2006, indicating they consumed more gas despite the increased price.
Saudi Arabia Says Market Doesn't Need More Oil
Bloomberg) -- Saudi Arabia, facing calls from oil- consuming nations to pump more crude, has no plans to raise output because increased supply wouldn't damp record prices, Argus reported, citing Oil Minister Ali al-Naimi.Adding the country's spare supplies would ``destabilize'' the market by flooding it with oil that isn't needed, al-Naimi said, according to Argus. Pressure to raise output is ``probably politically driven,'' he said.
Economies Can Cope With Higher Oil Price, Libya Says
``For years we've been saying the era of cheap oil is over,'' Shokri Ghanem, chairman of Libya's National Oil Corp., said today in Rome before the International Energy Forum, which starts tomorrow. ``None of us thought it would reach $115 a barrel so quickly, so it could reach $120'' this week.The world economy ``has not reached the tipping point where it can't accept higher prices,'' Ghanem said.
Chinese oil product wholesalers should have minimum 15 days reserve
BEIJING (Xinhua) -- The Chinese Ministry of Commerce (MOC) said on Friday that the more than two year long-brewed "Administrant and technical criterion for wholesale enterprise of refined oil product" would take effect on May 1.This criterion orders refined oil product enterprises to have at least 15 days of oil reserve on the basis of last year's average sales volume, a move to better stabilize market order.
Nigeria: Military Cannot Protect You, MEND Threatens Oil Companies
Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, (MEND) has warned oil companies working along the coastal region of Nigeria to be ready for war, just as it said the military was not in a position to protect them.MEND said the oil companies were in for a raw deal, stressing that it had decided to step up its attack on oil installations ahead of schedule. "And there will be many more to follow," it assured.
Kremlin ‘threats’ to GML solicitor over Yukos oil company
A British businessman challenging the Russian government over its break-up of the Yukos oil company has accused the Kremlin of threats and intimidation.Tim Osborne, a solicitor and director of GML, the majority shareholder in the now-defunct Yukos, said his foreign travel has been restricted since Russia’s prosecutor general announced he was under investigation for alleged embezzlement of $10 billion (£5 billion).
Mention the concepts permaculture, global warming, environmental education and the peak oil crisis five years ago and the reaction would have been a glazed-eyed vacant expression.Say it today and you can expect dire Apocalyptic predictions about impending doom and gloom with parts of Al Gore’s “Inconvenient Truth” quoted with religious fervour.
But these trendy catchwords aren’t vague concepts for Cuba’s Roberto Perez – they’ve been part of his stark reality since the early 1990s when his home country was plunged into economic crisis overnight with its loss of access to Soviet oil, fertilizers and export trade market.
UK: Four days' fuel left as refinery strike looms
FILLING stations across Scotland have only four days worth of fuel left, experts warned last night as a strike at the country's only oil refinery looms closer.Supplies to airports, petrol stations and businesses across Scotland, northern England and Northern Ireland could be disrupted within a week as contingency plans to close operations at Grangemouth begin today.
Gas prices box in an Alabama community
Cars have connected Wilcox County with the wider world, and with jobs. But now the drive doesn't pay off.
Asia's Optimism Misplaced as Oil Heads for $200
The decoupling story has come full circle. A year ago, Asia had outgrown the West. Then, as Asian shares fell, those arguing the region could stand alone became very quiet. Now the talk is that even with the U.S. teetering on recession, Asia's rapid growth will allow its markets to rise. Call it Decoupling Theory 2.0.There are problems with this thesis, not least of which is the surging price of oil and food, and risks of wage-related inflation.
The UAE's electricity demand projections are staggering. Based on future development plans, the current installed capacity of energy will need to double by 2015. The amount of energy the UAE consumes is set to treble by 2020 - a reflection of a very energy-intensive lifestyle. Even as the energy-producing Middle East sells its wares in lucrative global markets, the UAE looks set to suffer from the resulting demand and price rise.
Report: Iran's president says oil prices too low
TEHRAN, Iran - Iran's hard-line president declared that crude oil prices, now above $115 a barrel, are too low, state media reported Saturday.President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad told an oil and gas exhibition in Tehran on Friday that he thought the commodity still had to "discover its real value," according to the Web site of Iran's state-run television.
Paying the price for ignoring the real economy
Addressing the latest meeting of Development Committee of World Bank and IMF in Washington on April 13, the Finance Minister, Mr P. Chidambaram, lamented that high crude oil and galloping food prices were imposing a crushing burden on developing countries.According to the Finance Minister, the price of crude (currently at around $110 a barrel) does not reflect either the cost of production or risks inherent in the market, and not even the interplay of demand and supply. Diversion of food crops for bio-fuels resulted in food inflation that hit the poor nations the hardest, he asserted.
France’s answer to global food crisis is EU protectionism
France has launched a political campaign to restore food protectionism at the heart of Europe’s agriculture policy as food riots erupt in poor countries and global leaders give warning of the dire consequences of soaring grain prices.At a high-level EU agriculture meeting in Luxembourg, Michel Barnier, the French Agriculture Minister, called on Europe to establish a food security plan and to resist further cuts in Europe’s agriculture budget.
EU set to scrap biofuels target amid fears of food crisis
The European commission is backing away from its insistence on imposing a compulsory 10% quota of biofuels in all petrol and diesel by 2020, a central plank of its programme to lead the world in combating climate change.Amid a worsening global food crisis exacerbated, say experts and critics, by the race to divert food or feed crops into biomass for the manufacture of vehicle fuel, and inundated by a flood of expert advice criticising the shift to renewable fuel, the commission appears to be getting cold feet about its biofuels target.
Obama, Clinton woo coal vote in upcoming primaries
WASHINGTON - Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are walking a delicate line as they promise to aggressively tackle global warming while trying to assure voters that they continue to believe in the future of coal.
18 states commit to take action on climate change
NEW HAVEN, Conn. - California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger predicted Friday that an international deadlock over how to deal with global warming will end once President Bush leaves office, while a leading expert warned of dire consequences if urgent action is not taken.Schwarzenegger spoke at a conference at Yale University in which 18 states pledged to take action on climate change. He noted a dispute over whether the U.S. should commit to reducing its greenhouse gas emissions before China and India do the same.
US climate change plan branded 'Neanderthal'
A new plan from US President George Bush which aims to cap greenhouse gases by 2025 has been dismissed as "disastrous" and "Neanderthal" by a group of ministers at a climate change meeting in Paris.
Bush's climate goals vague – but a start
"Given the administration's track record and its reputation on global climate-change policy to date, this is a step in the right direction," says Robert Stavins, an environmental economist at Harvard University.
Freshening of deep Antarctic waters worries experts
SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Scientists studying the icy depths of the sea around Antarctica have detected changes in salinity that could have profound effects on the world's climate and ocean currents.
Arctic Meltdown: The Economic and Security Implications of Global Warming
Thanks to global warming, the Arctic icecap is rapidly melting, opening up access to massive natural resources and creating shipping shortcuts that could save billions of dollars a year. But there are currently no clear rules governing this economically and strategically vital region. Unless Washington leads the way toward a multilateral diplomatic solution, the Arctic could descend into armed conflict.
Ahhh, the good ol' days:
http://www.theonion.com/content/node/27257
"Driving to and from living room and fridge" - why not? It's a free country, right?
I still remember gas being 92.9 cents per gallon.
I remember when petrol first reached 20 cents per litre in Australia. 1979. I was only a kid at the time, so people must have been complaining pretty loudly for me to remember it.
People have this tendancy to think that what they see in front of their faces everyday is normal. But "normal" changes all the time.
People have an idea of "normal" based on their experiences during the last decade or two. Anything that doesn't fit with that limited experience is "fanciful" or impossible. I always think it is funny how economists talk about "the post-war period" as if we legislated away chaos in 1945, and any return to the instability of prior errors is so unlikely it is not worth discussing.
If you are willing to go back even a hundred years in shaping your worldview, you have to admit that anything is possible,the rules can change completely in the space of a year and turn the world upside down, and people don't like to think about that.
Your story in Australia in 1979 reminds me of when my Father and I filled up in Los Angeles in 1965 (I was 9) for 28 cents a gallon, (that's almost 4 gallons for 1 buck!) while two guys feverishly washed the windshield, checked tire pressure, trani fluid, radiator and oil. They use to have gas wars back then, where stations would compete for your business by lowering the price to beat the other stations and offering greater service at the pump. They actually had soap in the bucket to clean the windshield, and those guys did it so often they could clean it without leaving a single streak. It's a moment in time etched in memory.
Call it the opposite of today when I passed our local station that has water with no soap to clean the windshield yourself, and every type of gas is over 4 bucks for 1 gallon.
In the UK we still remember, barely, $4.00 a gallon. Try the current price round here £1.079 per litre and thats not the most expenive in the UK - nearly $10.00 a gallon, depending which measure of a gallon you use US or Imperial.
I remember gasoline being about $0.45 per gallon, & motor oil $0.25 per quart. The first time I saw gas >$1.00 per gallon was in the Yukon Territory, driving an F-350 Ford truck to Alaska. I thot "What's the world coming to?" at that price.
We are the lucky generations, favored by chance to have lived during the extremely narrow window in human history when fossil fuels were cheap & abundant and antibiotics actually worked. My greatgrandparents farmed with horses, my grandparents' generation moved to town & worked in factories, my parents were mod & educated and worked in offices, my generation were hippie throwbacks to the land who could afford to not take survival seriously, my kids are IT techies struggling with debt, my grandkids won't have horses to farm with & will likely starve or die of infection from bacteria that have evolved multiple antibiotic resistence. What amazing times these are.
Darwin-
In the 60's in LA, I never paid more that .25 per gallon. (about .09 per liter).
Of course, the dollar did go a bit further those days, and survival was simple.
Rent for 3 months in Huntington Beach? $90.00.
Darwinsdog -
I too have been have similar thoughts regarding the uniqueness of growing up during the Postwar boom, which I would roughly place as the period from about 1953 through the late 1960s, or thereabouts.
Not only was fuel cheap and totally taken for granted, but there was a pervasive optimism that the future would be better (provided we didn't get nuked by them Rooskies) and that one's children would do better than one's own generation. Even throughout the turmoil of the late 1960s, economic and resource worries appeared to more in the background.
If one came from a working-class background, it was a given article of faith that if you acquired a college diploma, it would be an automatic ticket to a life of prosperity. Of course, this may have been wishful thinking on the part of a lot of second-generation immigrant families, but nonetheless there was faith that the system would hold and that there would be a niche in that system for almost everyone (of course it helped to be white).
As an example, I graduated from a small eastern engineering school, class of '67. Of the 270 graduates, EVERY single one had at least one job offer, and the average number of job offers was something like 4.4. When I relate this little factoid to young people that react with total disbelief.
If things continue the way they are, I think colleges and universities are going to be in for a real hard time, as it becomes more and more apparent that going to college is no longer going to offer much promise of bettering oneself economically. College was once largely the domain of the professional and monied classes, and it wasn't until after WW II that there was a flood of young working-class people attending college, all looking for a shot at the American Dream. I think we might see a retrenchment, in which enrollment at colleges and universities will shrink and we will once again see these institutions revert to serving a smaller body of elites. This would be entirely consistent with the ongoing hollowing out of the American middle class. Alas.
This reminds me of the return of wheat stem rust (UG99) which has been on my mind lately. We bred disease resistant wheat varieties back in the 60s, which resulted in much more reliable yields, which together with pesticides and fertilisers has allowed grain supplies to increase to the point where we can feed 6 billion people.
However, a new form of wheat rust has evolved which can overcome the most common genes for resistance in modern wheat varieties, and is likely to make it to India in the next couple of years. Wheat yields could be severely reduced. Fertiliser is getting more expensive due to demand and higher oil & gas prices, shipping costs and production costs for pesticides are rising as oil prices rises. Can the "green-revolution" get a second wind post-peak?
We are due to hit 7 billion in 2012, and 8 billion in 2025. Most of the extra people will be a band from Nigeria to Bangladesh.
It seems to me that at some point the population growth omnibus is going to run into the brick wall of peak food. And the more people on the bus when that happens, the more horrific the resulting mess is going to be.
In that band they are breeding madly without any thought as to where their future food is going to come from. I hope they don't intend to export their extra billions to us.
Racist much?
There is no reason why we should suffer for their failure to keep their reproduction to sensable levels. Out food resources wouls break under the strain.
They're just doing what they can...
They know it takes many dozens of them to match the consumption of any ONE of us. What is the reason that they should suffer for our failure to keep our consumption to sensible levels?
Not to forget that you're making a blanket statement about the reproduction choices of the population between Nigeria and Bangladesh.
Damn, you almost sound American with such rubbish!
But it's OK for developed countries to use virtually all of the energy resources (US: <5% of population, but uses >20% of all the energy) and to waste enough food to feed millions?
Jesus, I hope you are banned soon.
Jeers
Well I doubt Weatherman is Jesus, but I agree with his thoughts.
Humans love to tie arguments together, especially if it avoids dealing with them properly. The developed world uses too much. Thats a problem. The undeveloped world breeds too much. Thats a problem.
You cannot excuse one because of the other.
Both are caused by lack of government.
Which is the unstabilised, exponential problem?
Yes because every day I hear a government spokesman telling people to stop consuming to benefit the economy and to stop breeding to save national resources..... Oh wait no I don't!
Anyone who blames the current food crisis on the poor is __________. (< fill in your own adjective.)
This isn't even worth discussing. There is, at present, the ability to feed the world. There is, at present, not enough willingness to do so. While total numbers will be a problem, they are not the problem now. This is obvious and it is inarguable.
I have no patience for those who blame victims.
Color me disgusted.
Cheers
How about plain old classism? Rich VS poor.
There only two classes of people those that labour for their returns and those that steal from the first class.
You're probably right, Eric.
The two are tough to disentangle, much of the time.. but it's rarely useful to sling that word around, regardless.
Weatherman, to be clear, I don't know you, and I would just say that your >Statement< was racist or classist, not necessarily you.
Apologies, Bob
Studies have shown the birth rates in NW Africa are amongst the highest in the world. No mention was made of race. It may be lack of ethics, poor planning, not seeing the results of one's actions, lack of good education, different moral values, etc.
And the American contributers should realise that we are on the doorstep of NW Africa.
At that point, you might say Which studies.
Beyond that, these Nations have been subjected (literally) to colonization by Nations that are adept at painting their own moral superiority, probably with a thick layer of material frosting to emphasize their provenance and approval by God, the material being supplied by these perpetually impoverished subjects.. 'Different Moral Values', indeed.
On the northeast corner of Nineteenth Avenue and Ortega in San Francisco is a Standard (Chevron) gas-station. I worked at that gas-station from January, 1972 to October, 1976; I was at San Francisco State at this time, so I worked weekends during the school year and full-time for most of the summer.
When I first started working there, gasoline fluctuated between 25.9 and 35.9 cents per gallon, (for Premium, or Ethyl, as it was then often known, Regular was a three or four cents a gallon cheaper) as, if I recall correctly, they had for the past decade or more. The price fluctuation was due to the ongoing “gas wars” conducted by local gas-stations. I could come to work one weekend and gas prices would be at the bottom of the range, and we would be quite busy, the next weekend the prices would have gone up a few cents, and the weekend after that we would be at or near the top or the scale, and business was quite slow. Then, the next week, prices would have plunged down to the bottom of the scale again, and the whole cycle would continue.
But, although none of us working at the gas station were aware of Peak Oil, or the fact that the US had hit its peak back in 1970, this last fact undoubtedly was behind the unexplained minor shortages that started appearing in mid to late 1972, the first of the long lines at the station, and the price (temporarily, as I recall) rising to an unprecedented 40 cents a gallon. But the optimism of that era was deeply entrenched, I recall at the time gas hit the 40 cent mark sitting around with four or five co-workers at the gas-station on a slow day, and asking how long it would take gas to reach a buck a gallon. Everyone looked around, thought, then the unanimous verdict was: “Naah, never happen.”
Anyway, I don’t know if we made arrangements with the Saudis or others for increased imports, because, as I recall, this 1972 mini-crisis seemed to melt away after a few months. But this didn’t last long, as the Arab Oil Embargo came down in mid-October of 1973, and its effects begin to be felt at the pumps only several weeks later. At first this consisted of price rises, to what were for the times, unprecedented levels. I recall going out to service a car, and the old guy in it looked at the price on the pump, a mind-boggling 50 cents a gallon. He looked at me and said “F**k you, I’m not paying you rip-offs” He started to drive off, but before he left, I snarled back at him, “Well, Asshole, you’ll run out of gas before you find anything cheaper, the price is the same everywhere.” And the price WAS the same everywhere, from now on it would only move upward or at best hang steady, the era of the “gas-wars” between service-stations was over, forever.
And the gas-wars were not the only long-standing business practice to end, forever. Before the Arab Oil Embargo, gas-stations, grocery stores of all sizes, and other retail outlets gave away trading stamps. People born this side of the late ‘60’s probably have never seen these, but they were a regular feature at retail outlets throughout my childhood and teenage years. On the West Coast, the trading stamps were Blue Chip Stamps and S&H Green Stamps, with Blue Chip being by far the more widely offered. Each stamp had printed on it “Cash Value One Mill.” (A mill is one tenth of one cent.) These were actual stamps, about two-thirds the size of an ordinary postage stamp, and gummed on the back, and you pasted them into booklets which, when a sufficient quantity was amassed, could be redeemed for stuff like toasters, vacuum cleaners, etc., mostly household appliances and stuff, as I recall. Anyway, these vanished from the entire retail scene, not just the gas stations shortly after the Arab Oil Embargo really started kicking in. Gas-stations in general, as far back as I remember, also offered free state and local highway maps that they gave away to their customers. Maps didn’t disappear, but they were no longer free as a price-tag of from 50 cent to a buck was now charged. And, of course, the Embargo was the beginning of the end for the true “service-station”, before, “self-service” was rare, but from this point in time on, it expanded, while the full service stations continued to diminish in numbers over the years.
When the Oil Embargo was first announced, the first effect were the price rises. Most people must have (incredibly, naively, from to-day’s vantage point) thought all this would be quite temporary, as for the first week or two of the Embargo, business was slow, as, I suppose people, like the guy who buzzed me off over 50-cent gas must have thought that prices would soon come down. It takes about six weeks for a tanker to sail from Saudi Arabia to the U.S., so six weeks after the Embargo was announced, the effect became quite noticeable, and the real gas lines became an everyday feature. This was when the government installed the odd-even (based on your car’s license number) sort of “Rationing Lite” system. And the oil companies practiced their own rationing, as each service station received a specific monthly allotment of gasoline. Scotty (Scotty Petrie, the operator of the 19th and Ortega station at this time) calculated that if he sold every car all the gas they wanted, that he would exhaust the monthly allotment that Standard Oil granted him in slightly more than two weeks. So Scotty instituted a limit of 8 gallons to every car coming into the pumps. Business hours were also cut back, and this created problems with the long lines of waiting autos, which backed out of the station and went up the street, frequently curling around the block and extend up most of that block. So, a couple of hours before closing time, we would take a large cardboard sign that said “Last Car”, go out to the last car an the line and inform the driver he was lucky, as he would be the last getting gas here to-day, then hang the sign on the back of his car. One day, I went out with the sign, and as it turned out, the last car sort of stood out, an almost overwhelmingly bright yellow VW Bug. I put the sign on the car, and returned to the gas-station and continued pumping gas. A couple hours later the yellow VW comes up and I sell it its gas, and went on to service the next car after the VW departed. It wasn’t until three or four cars had bought their eight gallons that I flashed on the fact that the VW was supposed to be the last car for the day. There were several cars still in line with the sign now on the last of them. It turned out that after I left the sign on the VW, the next car came up, and offered the driver of the VW $5 to take the sign and put it on his own car; he then sold the sign to the next car coming behind him, and so on. Ever after that, an employee of the gas-station had to simply stand by the last car, and slowly walk with it as it inched towards the station, and waving off all would-be customers.
After five months, King Faisal of Saudi Arabia felt he had wrested as much as he could out of the US and the West insofar as seriously addressing the (at the time) 25 year old Arab-Israel conflict. So the Embargo was lifted, and the oil flow resumed. But before the Embargo, the Saudis were getting something like $2.80 per barrel, afterward, as part of the price for restoring production, Faisal insisted on, and got a price of $11.65 per barrel. And the era of 25-35 cent gasoline, along with free maps and trading stamps, was over….Forever.
Anyway, thanks for the trip down Memory Lane. A lot of it just seems unbelievable now, free maps and trading stamps and getting cussed out behind 50 cent gas. Definitely, it was another era.
Antoinetta III
AntoinettaIII, thanks for the great bit of writing---better than Herb Caen!...
Thanks for that, just great.
I bought 90 cents' worth of gas today, because that's what I had in my pocket and I wanted to be able to get into Town *and* back. Did some (caricature) work so I can now afford to gas up the bike AND go to the Laundromat. I'm really looking forward to not having to buy gas at all.........
Cheer up, your grand kids won't have the many compounds in their food that suppress their immune systems, or fragile immune systems from being raised too clean. Antibiotic resistance is only an advantage for a bug if there is antibiotics.
I remember when I was around 12 years old, there was a "gas war". Now, this is different than the current war over oil in Iraq. It was where the gas stations would compete over customers by lowering prices to extremely low levels. The station my Dad patronized was offering gas for *FREE* for any customers with their station's credit card. Here we are 40 years later at $3.99.9 now at our local N.CA. stations (diesel is $4.39.9).
Our local county and city "leaders" are busy talking about "economic development" and getting more tourists to come and spend money here... while I see LESS road traffic and tourists as energy prices continue to climb. This is happening while the county is saying they will have to cut back on road maintenance and winter snow plowing because they cannot afford asphalt and diesel fuel.
The nearest airport is in the midst of a huge expansion... Obviously they are not considering how these planes will be fueled. When will people "get" what is going on and direct meaningful and appropriate change? Probably not until forced.
Todd
I'm assuming you live in or near Shasta, California, a beautiful area. I live near a similar area that is almost completely dependent upon tourism in Colorado.
We just had a local election for Mayor and town board and one of the questions is what we do in the fact of rising oil and gas prices given our dependency on those who get here by auto. A very popular answer had to do with "Better marketing". Impose an additional 2% tax on lodging and beef up the marketing effort.
So, in this area, I guess, the future for dependency on the automobile is secure.
I will give some credit to one of the mayoral candidates, however. I asked him what we were going to do with $200 oil and $10 per gallon gasoline. The gist of his answer is that the town might just wither away to something resembling the 1920s, a playground essentially for the the rich. That may be the more realistic and honest answer.
Yes, indeedy. All America needs is better marketing and this country is gonna grow.
There are a few tourist destinations left, however, that are adjacent to or near what is left of our train system, i.e., AMTRAK. In the future, especially if we could get the system upgraded to Bulgarian standards, these tourist areas will prosper, relatively speaking,to those completely dependent upon the auto.
That may include us down here in South East Florida USA (beaches) 'cept we might be under water in 25+ years.
Pete
That a highway was considered to be more important than a rail connection to a few keys with no point on each more than an hours bike ride apart is something that I still can't understand.
I'm assuming as a Floridian you're familiar with the East Coast line down to Key West which was wiped out in...1920?
Well there were hurricanes but I guess the one that did it in was the 1935 one...Labor day storm?
There is a region (the entire keys) crying out for transit and a bike sharing program.