This is amazing. It’s up again, I don’t believe it. The past few years have been the most dramatic increase of oil that I ever seen.
They make every possible excuse on television for this, but if there were shortages, it would have been like the 70’s with the long lines. I don’t think these excuses are holding water (or maybe oil).
I’ve read contradiciting analyses - doomsayers are predicting that we are on the downhill slide of our oil extracting capacity. Then there are those who oppose that interprretation. It WILL happen, and cause tremendous changes in society, the question is when.
Good thing I have my plastic flute already. In 50 years, when oil is nonexistent, it will become a huge collector’s item on Ebay!
Two weeks ago, I was being quoted $2.579 by my current heating oil company for the coming season. Another company quoted me $2.359. I’m sure it has gone up since then, and I didn’t lock the price since we were leaving on vacation and I ran out of time. That comes to paying $260 a month, 12 months a year to heat my house for the winter, on the budget plan. Why doesn’t the government come in with emergency relief/price regulation for the northern states that depend on heating oil? Gas prices be damned, the real emergency is going to be heating oil. There are a lot of people who will have to choose between heat and food at these prices, and the heating season is only 2 months away.
Robin
Boycotts have always worked well in the past. Not all the oil companies, just pick a couple of biggies like Esso and Shell. If no-one were to buy oil off them for 6-10 months you would see their prices dropping like a rock, and once they were undercutting everyone else, prices in general would fall.
If you’re stupid enough to pay these prices, they’d be stupid not to charge them. This is called capitalism.
djm
Boycott sounds like a good idea…on the other hand, I’m not really in favor of frozen pipes, either!!
Robin
Heat Tape. Or Hydrogen compression.
US oil production peaked about 30 years ago and has been declining steadily ever since. UK North Sea production is also on the decline.
I’m afraid you’ll just have to get used to it - high oil prices are here for the foreseeable future. 
(You wanna try filling a car with gas on this side of the pond - that’ll really make your eyes water!)
(BTW : Some good info on peak oil theory here).
oscartherabbit wrote
(You wanna try filling a car with gas on this side of the pond - that’ll really make your eyes water!)
Too true if they were paying the the $7.50-$8 per imperial gallon that we pay here then they would really be complaining.
US oil production is falling, yes, but the reserves of oil in the States are actually quite high - the vast majority of oil there is shale oil it is only the economics of extraction that stop it being used. If the price of oil keeps rising then shale oil production will become economic.
David
Any there lies the irony - the only thing that can allow the US to increase output by tapping into its oil shale reserves is a high oil price.
Remember the Alaskan Pipeline that was supposed to be the answer to our oil independance?
I suspect that all this cheap imported stuff we’re getting from China probably is using up a lot of fuel to make this.
I don’t know if its still relevant, but there was an issue where the EPA was pushing for all gas emmissions to be reduced/cleaned up, and also they wanted to force the oil refining business to clean up its act. My understanding was that the refiners upped their prices supposedly to cover the cost of cleaning up, but didn’t do anything to clean up, and have not increased their refining capacity in protest. Oil supply is not the problem, according to the press. A shortage of refined oil products is now the problem. Anyone know the latest on this stuff?
djm
Car sales are up due to the promotions. Many of the best selling models are full size pickups and SUVs. This tells me that people are not consuming less, just shifting their spending. This means the price of oil will keep going up until the majority of people start changing their habits. I think $5 per gallon of gas in the States may be a tipping point, but that is just a guess. $3 does not look like it will deter most people.
As for refining, there will be no new refineries built in the United States. Companies would be almost crazy to do so with the cost (over $1 billion per refinery), the regulations, the time it takes to bring a plant online, and no guarantees of oil supply or demand for refined products. The crunch is probably going to get worse next year as a certain procedure/chemical (MTBE) will stopped being used, reducing refining capacity next year.
Demand from China continues to grow rapidly and is one reason oil prices are sticky on the way down. The government is filling their strategic reserve and uses every dip in price to add an extra pinch.
In our neighborhood, we’ve been invaded by urban expansion (aka Yuppies) it’s amazing how of them drive SUV’s, trucks. There have been days when my car was the only non-SUV vehicle at the gas station.
Every year I get to laugh at them, the first snow comes and all the 4wd vehicles are stuck in the median, while I drive by them in my little front wheel drive car.
You know, when we talk about high gas and oil prices, the first thing everyone talks about is the high price of operating a car, but the real impact (other than the heating oil that someone else mentioned, which is going to cause a serious crisis in areas that depend on it) is being felt in the grocery line. I’ve already noticed that I’m paying nearly twice as much for two weeks worth of groceries than I was at this time last year. There was even an article on it in the paper yesterday…so much of agriculture is dependent on oil, from farm machinery to the trucks that transport food to market. If gas prices continue to rise like this, we could face a serious economic crisis across the board.
Redwolf
Yup, Red. Diesel especially will bring produce prices way up. However, food has been so very cheap for a long time, that I am not sure it will be inflationary. It might seem expensive, but really all the global deals have suppressed at least fresh produce prices.
The U.S. is hamstrung on energy. The emotional popular consensus is AGAINST the following: nuclear power, drilling more in Gulf or SoCal waters, ANWAR exploration. We’re basically screwed.
France and some others have pledged a huge commitment to nuclear power using a salt water process. How is it that there are so many Leftists who will allow nuclear power there while the same is not true in the U.S.?
Too much emotion in public policy.
Oh yeah, Weeks?
Why don’t I just drive my nuclear powered Mini over there an’ show ya whats up, foo. 
I seem to remember hearing that certain modern nuclear power plants are much safer and potentially cleaner than the older (3-mile island) type. Also that spent fuel can be reprocessed to extract more energy; however, this would require not using a plutonium producing process in the first round. Anybody know the details about that? I’m pretty vague on it, as you can see, but if there were a better type of power plant available, it seems very short-sighted to dismiss nuclear power out of hand.
Robin
from:
http://www.gaiaproject.bc.ca/GAIA/Website/GAIA/Website/pages/EducResources/Energy.htm
Canadian Tire has started selling solar panels. Next summer I think I’m going to build a solar powered fountain for the garden (well, it’s more of a balcony). It’s the perfect invention. I could make millions, I’m telling you. MILLIONS! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.
I read a book called Gaia: An Atlas of Planet Management that was eye-opening. There was a model for a tidal power plant in it that stuck in my head. Think of that. All the hydroelectric power you could dream of without blocking rivers and destroying spawning habitats. No toxic emissions, minimal environmental impact…
The book was written over a decade ago when oil was too cheap to bother developing alternative energy sources. I think the prohibitive cost of oil is a great opportunity to reach a turning point and start using more efficient, cleaner and (ultimately) cheaper sources of energy. I think it will be a major tragedy if humanity wastes the opportunity to evolve by turning to nuclear energy.
I think that is what the Europeans are pursuing, Fiddler. But US policy, and environmental policy is a mixture of science and fear.
I think you would have been shouted down in leftist circles in the past though for suggesting anything nuclear. Looks like that is changing.