An “expert” is saying this morning that the high price for gasoline is being prompted by a low supply. Well that’s a new one! Until I read this particular article, everything else I’ve read has lead me to believe that we have one of the biggest reserves in the world. We also have one of the highest pump prices in the world for a country that produces oil. And the blame falls squarely on speculators.
In other words, we are paying for worry-warts who are guessing what might happen and putting their grubby hands in our wallets – just in case.
The revealing portion of this new analysis as pure bullshit is in the acknowledgement that last week’s steep drop in the price of crude wasn’t reflected at the pumps. A CIBC analyst says that’s because retailers expected the price to inch up again so they didn’t adjust their prices. Speculation.
A widely distributed email campaign this month encouraged drivers to avoid Petro-Canada and Esso for May, and send the message that we have the power. We have an independent retailer in the plaza next door and tend to fill up there, for convenience if nothing else, so we’re on board with the campaign. But is anybody else? The attitude that, “we’re helpless” is exactly what’s draining our bank accounts just to get to work and back each day.
Although speculation definitely is an underlying contributor to the volatility in oil prices, there is some justification for speculation for those companies who are significant users of the by products such as airlines.
However, there is a bottleneck in the production pipe line from the point it is retrieved until it reaches the consumer and that is in the area of refiners. New refining capacity hasn’t been built in over 30 years in North America and yet consumption has significantly increased during the same period. If Canadian consumers want governments to do something about the price of gas, they need to encourage them to sanction and approve the building of more refineries, but then no one wants them built in there back yards and there’s the catch.
A friend of mine traveled through Venezuela on his motorcycle about 2 weeks ago. He said to fill his bike from empty cost around 28 cents US! He said that a couple times as he was walking to pay he was waved off by the employee inside as if to say “ah, don’t worry about it”. Apparently it’s quite common when there are 3 or 4 vehicles being filled at the same time for one of the customers to pay for the others’ gas without even knowing them! Just imagine!!
Where I live in Innisfil, the Pioneer station is always 3-4cents cheaper than the 2 ESSO stations within a 8km. radius. This morning I filled up @ 125.7 and the other stations were132.5.
How can this be??????????