(SAN FRANCISCO) — Californians woke up to a shock Friday as overnight gasoline prices jumped by as much as 20 cents a gallon in some areas, ending a week of soaring costs that saw some stations close and others charge record prices.
The average price of regular gas across the state was nearly $4.49 a gallon, the highest in the nation, according to AAA’s Daily Fuel Gauge report.
In Southern California, the price jumped 20 cents a gallon overnight to $4.53 in Ventura. And in the Los Angeles-Long Beach area prices went up 19 cents to nearly $4.54. And it wasn’t any better to the north, as a gallon of regular gas in San Francisco averaged nearly $4.60.
In many areas, prices have jumped 40 cents in a week as refinery problems have created shortages and helped send wholesale prices soaring. Some stations ran out of gas and shut down Thursday rather than pay those costs.
The California legislature is responsible for the high fuel costs, because they forced a special fuel formulation on us and we can’t import fuel from outside our state because it doesn’t meet the strict state standard. However, the state standard is of questionable benefit for pollution. Studies have shown that the formulation creates ground pollution which offsets whatever minimal reduction in air pollution there may be.
Some areas of California, like Calabasas, are charging over $5.27 a gallon. Thank you State Legislature, California is now a virtual island among the rest of the states and this wisdom is showing up at the pump price. Brilliant.
FYI, Reno, and Nevada in general I assume, is consistently higher, without the same regulations.
Nope. You better check GasBuddy.com. They have a map showing prices across the USA. Nevada is consistently cheaper.
“The California legislature is responsible for the high fuel costs, …”
… and our cleaner air. I don’t want to go back to chronically brown air. Do you? Really?
What’s more, we’re really gonna do this green-house gas reduction thing … and drag you, kicking and screaming, into a healthier environment. And … if you really don’t want to be dragged, there is always Texas.
Libby, you are still only getting half the picture…the left half. Try this tidbit on and see how it fits:
The EPA requires the new reformulated gasoline to have an oxygen content of just over 2 percent to help the gasoline burn cleaner. The two primary oxygenate additives are ethanol (corn alcohol) and methyl tertiary butyl ether (MTBE). Because these additives are not pure oxygen, the amount needed to meet the required oxygen content is significant. For example, since MTBE is only 19 percent oxygen, RFG made with this oxygenate additive must contain at least 11 percent MTBE.2
For environmentalists ethanol presents a dilemma. On the plus side it is a renewable energy source. On the minus side it is highly volatile. (It evaporates far more rapidly than gasoline.) In the summer the evaporative emissions of ethanol before combustion are a major contributor to smog. This serves to negate the advertised benefit of reduced tailpipe emissions.3 It is therefore not surprising that advocates of ethanol only want us to look at what happens during and after combustion. To offset this problem, ethanol needs to be blended with a more expensive, lower-volatility gasoline that is not readily available in the market.4 To make the situation worse, the ethanol separates from the gasoline if it is transported by pipeline over any significant distance. Because of this distribution problem, ethanol needs to be mixed with non-oxygenated gasoline as close to the final market as possible.5
Given all these inherent problems (environmental, cost, and logistical), ethanol is extremely fortunate to have very strong support from the Big Corn lobby. This is a coalition of Midwest politicians, big agriculture, and such agri-business firms as Archer Daniels Midland. Ethanol is exempt from federal excise taxes.
MTBE is derived from natural gas. It has been used since the late 1970s in low concentrations as an octane booster. This coincided with the phase-out of lead in gasoline. Compared to ethanol, MTBE is far less expensive and it can be more easily added during the refining process. For these reasons, MTBE is used in over 87 percent of the reformulated gasolines. The oxygenated-gasoline mandate increased MTBE production from 83,000 barrels per day in 1990 to 269,000 barrels per day by 1997.6
While the RFG program is advertised as being great for the environment, the benefits for the consumer are hard to find. Since the oxygenate additives can cost up to twice as much as gasoline, reformulated gasoline can cost up to 10 cents more per gallon than the non-oxygenated gasoline.7 Unfortunately, it gets worse. Both major oxygenated additives have a lower energy content than regular gasoline, MTBE roughly 20 percent less, ethanol 30 percent less.8 This results in a 23 percent loss in fuel efficiency. Translation: Consumers pay more to get fewer miles per gallon than before.
Vanilla Gasoline
Before the reformulated-gas mandates started to kick in, the logistics of fuel distribution were relatively simple. The product was homogeneous; all gas was vanilla. When one area of the country was experiencing a higher demand, it was easy to redirect more gas from another area to meet it. With RFG, in addition to vanilla we now have rocky road gas, butter pecan gas, and pistachio almond gas. While some parts of the country will require RFG all year long, others will only need a special gas in the summer to combat high ozone levels. Still other areas will only need a special gas in the winter to address high carbon-monoxide levels. As a result of the requirement for multiple types of gasoline that vary both by location and season, the logistics of fuel distribution have become a nightmare for the petroleum industry.
Unfortunately for the consumer, multiple flavors of gas are not interchangeable. If one part of the country is running low on rocky road gas, you cannot divert surplus butter pecan. Thus it should not be surprising that since the implementation of the RGP there have been many shortages (with accompanying price spikes) in certain parts of the country.
Nice Cutlass!
But all that is about to become irrelevant as 1) we will be dropping the ethanol subsidy becaused it’s running food prices up outside the country (The rising price of bread in Egypt played no small part in Mubarak’s demise.) and 2) the rest of the country is coming with us … eventually … not the other way round. They’ll have no choice. So soon, we’ll all be on vanilla gas again, and that vanilla will be a much cleaner burning formulation.
Somebody has to be the first to say: “people, this ain’t gonna work.” Why aren’t you proud to be in the cool gang?