“Similarly, the Biden administration was full of woke environmentalists who believe in the global warming hoax, so they must have crippled energy production — even though America in the Biden years was, for the first time in generations, producing more energy than it consumed:”
Not only this professor, but most (70%) of the oil we do drill and produce, isn’t compatible with most of our refineries, or the cost of transport from Alaska, makes it cheaper to sell to the Asian market.
Another problem with the cost of production are the refinery bottlenecks. When prices sink too low, our refineries lose money and some of them close for good, as was the case when COVID hit; we lost four refineries which never came back during the short time we experienced a deflationary period.
Additionally, we currently have approximately 132 refineries in the US, with about 20% accounting for more than 50% of our overall production. This is down from 254 in 1982. And all of them operate 24/7 using 1970’s technology. We haven’t built a new plant since the 80’s, and should a major refinery suffer a catastrophic accident, it could send gas prices up exponentially, regardless if global oil prices are at $60 or $20 a barrel.
The recurring theme I’m noticing with all aspects of the Trump administration is the lack of urgency in replacing our aging infrastructure, and this is certainly in alignment with an empire on the decline. And with Trump in power, our possible status as the world’s largest economic and military superpower, is not only in doubt, but becoming inevitable. IMHO…:)
I would add that record oil production never meant independence from imports, because our refineries are set up to rotate between different grades of oil from those we produce domestically. Record oil *exports* may have been going out, but *imports* were still coming in, because that's what we have the capacity to refine.
Study the oil market... Some is "sour" (= acidic), others are "sweet".. Venezuela produces sour crude, Texas and North Slope are sweet... The Gulf of Mexico produces Both in varying quantities. Canadian tar sands are very sour...
Each refinery is built for X capacity and Y grade of sweetness. If you have available capacity your task is to locate and deliver matching crude supply.
Now, do that for economical production. And if THAT pipeline breaks...
As you know, I run a Substack—JosephZeigler.substack.com. It’s where I vent, reflect, and try to make sense of things. I always feel better after a post—writing helps. It clears the head, sharpens the thoughts, and occasionally gets a comment or two from someone equally baffled by the world.
I’ve noticed you haven’t posted on your own Substack, but your comments? They’re sharp, insightful, and often more compelling than many of the posts I’ve seen—mine included. That’s why I’m reaching out.
I’m a confirmed Trump critic—no surprise there—and I wrestle with whether I’ll ever truly understand or forgive the folks who voted for him. But I believe in dialogue, not dogma. If you’ve got a take, a reply, or something you've been itching to say, I’d love to give you space to say it.
No one here gets paid to write—not yet, anyway—but it's a lot of fun. And sometimes it’s exactly the kind of thing that helps us feel a little less powerless.
I’ve got degrees in engineering and economics, I write books, and I try to ground what I say in research. But mainly, I’m just an old guy doing what I can with the tools I’ve got left.
I went to your page, and I didn’t see your newsletter. Can you only access it going through the internet instead of the app? I also subscribed and will check out your columns later.
And thank you, some comments are good, others not so much, but I try. That said, I also have a degree in economics and history, so I will enjoy the conversation.
Yes, but that was no reason for Trump to not throw another key GOP constituency under the bus. Between the drop in oil prices he arranged with OPEC and the tariff's increase to their operating expenses, it'll be a miracle to see any oil drillers in business by the end of the year.
It's worse than that. Even if we had the refineries, we have tied our own hands in terms of domestic shipments of oil and gas between US ports with the Jones Act. We won't be building any new pipelines, trains, or compliant barges and tankers in the remainder or Trump's term, the lead times are longer than that. I don't know how much spare capacity the existing transport network might have, but I'm confident it's not enough to replace imports, considering there's not even enough compliant spare capacity after localized natural disasters.
The part of Keystone that already existed is more than sufficient to move current production of oil down to the coast for refining and export. Oil moved through a second leg (the part that was cancelled) would have mostly been sent to the gulf to be shipped overseas and these days there is more than sufficient production.
"The proposed Keystone XL extension actually comprised two segments. The first, a southern leg, had already been completed and now runs between Cushing, Oklahoma, and Port Arthur, Texas."
We actually export both oil and gasoline and became net exporters way back between 2009 and 2011 due to newer fracking technology and increased energy efficiency.
Gasoline: The new big U.S. export
By Steve Hargreaves @CNNMoney December 5, 2011: 1:01 PM ET
So, McCain's "Drill Baby Drill" became "old hat" not long after the 2008 election since production was already skyrocketing.
The largest increase in production was under Obama, not because of him, but because of new fracking technology. Also, new record levels were reached under Biden.
That is 100% a GOP lie and myth used to try to win elections, just look at the graph above from eia.
This is because presidents do NOT control oil production!
We are not a socialist country that controls private industries!
Yet, politicians campaign like this is the case.
These are independent companies acting in their own interests.
The world is glutted with oil at the moment, thus the lower prices. Companies have no incentive to invest to drill at the moment, because supply is outpacing demand due in part to EVs that are being produced globally. Both China and India produce inexpensive EVs.
The most likely scenario is that demand will continue to decline and at a minimum level off.
Keystone is largely a Canadian project to move tar sand oil. Much is currently shipped by rail to NJ for refining because the pipeline wasn't full length.
The pipeline was for Canada.. so they could easily export (instead of shipping via the Great Lakes) to the REST of the world (not the US)
Tar sands are the most environmental damaging way to extract oil! Canada seems unconcerned. Environmental groups seem indifferent to this fact. I guess wealth trumps all else.
The LNG market was turbocharged by Putin’s asinine invasion of Ukraine…and so now the natural gas in the tar sands can be piped to a port and exported as LNG.
I live in Southern Oregon. I believe that most of our fuel supply is trucked in from Eugene, approximately 190 miles give or take. When Trump came in, regular gas at Costco was 3.10/gal and 3.16 at Fred Meyer. It has been rising ever since, around 3.70 now at Freddy's. Per barrel costs for oil I believe are now around $60 or below.
Can anyone explain why the pump price here has been rising consistently during the past 3 1/2 months.
We saw an increase in CA, as well, about a month ago, so maybe a flip to summer blend and/or a refinery issue. Since then, somewhat consistent, but I will see when I am out today. I know Oregon switches to a summer blend too but AAA shows prices about the same over this last month.
I do not know if the Canadian tariffs are causing any issues. Hard to keep up with that.
That was expected to cause some increases in prices. Hard to know what has gone into effect or not.
"How Trump’s Tariffs On Mexico And Canada Could Impact U.S. Gas Prices"
By Robert Rapier, Senior Contributor. Robert Rapier is a chemical engineer covering the energy sector.
Prices have been inching up before the grifter was in office. All the while big oil receives subsidies. Why in the heck should we be paying these companies, that make insane profits (look at the numbers during Covid) AND pay them subsidies.
Thank you for this information. I had no idea how this worked. Frankly, I don't think anyone knows how this all works and that's the way they designed it. Corporations run this game.
Most do not know how it works because it has been used as a chip for politicians who have distorted it all. This also confuses the press who simply then too often repeat the political talking points (because it is easier) which are largely nonsense.
I simply started digging into it around 2011 looking up some of the GOP claims leading up to the 2012 election and started on fact check sites. This then gave me links to more resources.
Oil is a global commodity and its price is largely determined by global supply and demand (not just what we do here at home).
Then, the price of gas is largely influenced by this cost of oil globally+ refining costs.
"The Energy Information Administration (EIA) reports that oil prices are determined by global supply and demand, influenced by various factors like global economic conditions and geopolitical events. While global prices are the primary driver, local factors also play a role, such as refining costs and local market conditions."
Agreed on all points. Although, the Keystone pipeline won't help you get more oil out from net exporters like Houston, Corpus Christi, and Valdez to net importers like LA/Long Beach, NY/NJ, and other domestic destinations.
The cure for high commodity prices is…high commodity prices. So the Bush/Cheney administration failed to solve the energy crisis and their failure is what made fracking economical…none of their policies factored into developing fracking which they believed could never be economical. A key component of Bush’s solution was Palin’s natural gas pipeline to the lower 48…fracking made that obsolete and it was canceled. So believe it or not Bush’s solution to the energy crisis also involved importing LNG from Qatar and so even though we’ve never imported LNG from Qatar it was our capital that helped build Qatar’s LNG export infrastructure.
Qatar's LNG terminals has saved much of the EU after the 2022 Russian attack on Ukraine and the subsequent boycott of Russian LNG. Even the US is exporting LNG big time to the EU now.
Yep, Biden played the Ukrainian perfectly and strengthened and expanded NATO while making America energy dominant. And then Republicans pretended those things weren’t important even though they nominated McCain and Romney. And every day Trump is getting closer to continuing all of Biden’s policies which makes sense because Biden did a great job in a very turbulent 4 years…if Trump increases the top rate to 39.6% then we are getting Biden even though a Republican is president! Although I doubt Republicans in Congress give Trump that even though that and the Fed decreasing interest rates gets us to 3% deficit/GDP ratio in 2026.
This used to be true. Not so much since it was amended in 2021 to make waivers harder to grant and much more restrictive in what they could authorize, or for how long.
There is also neither an oil or gasoline shortage and we export both oil and gasoline. In fact excess production compared to supply globally is causing lower prices for a barrel of oil. OPEC had to cut production several times under Biden to boost prices to keep them profitable.
In addition, oil production in the USA has more than doubled, nearly tripled, in just over the last 15 years!
Most of this happened under Dem administrations, as well, because these are private companies doing what is in their own best interests based on global demand and because fracking technology increased production.
Presidents have little to nothing do with oil production because we are not a socialist country.
Weekly oil production in the USA is listed in the graph below going back decades.
In fact, there is so much oil on global markets that the price has dropped. EVs and other alternatives for transportation are not just being produced here, but in India and China, as well.
And don't forget that both China and India are producing cheap EVs on a large scale.
China actually has made huge strides in reducing emissions in its transportation sector.
OPEC was cutting again even as the economy grew in recent years, due to excess oil causing lower prices, but the projected sluggish economy now makes things worse.
I am not happy about a sluggish economy, but I am glad that demand is declining.
It is a pleasure to read or listen to intelligent conversations without prejudice or propaganda involved when people who converse know the subject! And to compare it to what is going on in our capital and on say, Fox tv is simply scary— the country is run by thieves who lie for a living and you can’t convince any maga members that Joe Biden’s America was prosperous and successful nation respected and appreciated and admired in the world everywhere and look at us now! We are in a free fall and until and unless a respected leader or a group of leaders starts leading we are going to keep falling and it’s a bottomless pit…,I pray for America and its people but many of Americans hate it because they feel that they deserve more, well with trump you will get even less and he could not care any less! Good luck to you!
Thank you and well said. However, as Yogi Berra once said, “it ain’t over, till it’s over!”
These are scary times, and I fear for my nieces and nephews. We were a nation on the decline, but Trump is an accelerant of the worst kind; more aptly put, he’s a one man walking, talking plague!
I often wonder how Trump got elected, and it literally took a village. A corrupt SCOTUS that slow rolled two criminal cases and carved out an unconstitutional immunity clause in the process. A complicit MSM that sane washed the guy, and billionaires who bent a knee a least a year before the election.
Not to mention, Musk and Zuckerberg using nefarious algorithms to push or suppress content on their platforms, and allowing disinformation campaigns, especially executed by foreign actors, to run rampant and with impunity on their platforms; all in the name of free speech.
And of course, there’s Biden, who never should have run again; instead, he should have honored the oath he promised; passing the baton to the next generation. Yet here we are!
I know our future looks bleak, but we will eventually persevere. Just stay strong and get ready to fight back when the opportunity presents itself. However, I do agree we have a leadership vacuum in the opposition, and very few are stepping up to the plate. Therefore, we don’t wait for them to lead. Groups are forming at the grass roots level, while lawyers file lawsuits, and people from all walks of life are joining the opposition.
Remember, you can’t lose, if you never quit. Part of the reason for our predicament is the fact that the religious fascists who are running the government today, never quit. They’ve lost hundreds of battles but not the war, because while the rest of us assumed they were down for the count, they never give up, or ever cease to amaze.
They’ve lost hundreds of battles, yet they just grow stronger, like a really dangerous fungus. These people are literal “sheeple-zombies” who are as ruthless as they are relentless.
That said, we just need to take a few plays out of their playbook, and find their vulnerabilities, for which there is no shortage of supply. And when the time comes, we pounce!
At least that’s my story, and I’m sticking to it. Have a great evening…:)
Whether he’s an asset, agent, useless idiot, or just an ordinary imbecile with delusions of grandeur; does it really matter at this point?
Bottom line: Russia couldn’t have dreamt up a better chaos agent, who destroys everything he touches, even if they wanted to. His is Russia and China’s wet dream.
Trump has singlehandedly destroyed our democracy, alliances, economy, rule of law. National Security Apparatus, education, NIH, CDC, USAID, DOJ and FBI…….and the list goes on!
And worse, while our economic and military decline is real, Trump just accelerated it, and made it inevitable. Need I say more?….:)
An asset or agent might be impeached more easily than an ordinary imbecile with delusions of grandeur. Maybe it’s a toss-up, impeachment or 25th amendment? Some day over the rainbow. . .
True, but we’re dealing with a complicit GOP (impeachment), a cabinet filled with loyal lapdogs and sycophants (25th Amendment), and don’t even get me started with Bondi and Patel at Justice and the FBI, respectively.
My point: who’s exactly is going to prosecute Trump and MAGA? So good luck with that!….:)
And a bunch of enthusiastic Trump supporters in the white electorate. It comes down to them. They are the crux of the problem, not Trump or any other politician.
My guess is that Trump is a moron, which makes him a useful idiot to anyone that he sympathizes with. Trump is a product of East Coast wise guys, guess what type of leaders he sympathizes with?
Is the reduction due to e-vehicles, upgrades to existing refineries? Certainly more vehicles on the road. There are fewer drilling rigs due to horizontal drilling no? Isn’t Canadian oil shipped to Louisiana for refining?
Yup, that’s why our two biggest oil importers are Canada and Mexico, respectively. The reduction has little to do with EV’s since as you’ve stated, we have more gas guzzling cars on the road than ever before.
Refineries are typically low profit margin businesses, that require lots of capital upgrades and repairs, and are extremely vulnerable to market conditions.
He's looting America. He's treating it like a leveraged buyout. No to improvement or investment. Everythink he can get his hands on turns into his money and his property.
100% agree, it’s a grift on a scale never seen before, and will continue to get worse.
We need to start kicking ass, and taking names, because when the dust settles, Trump has immunity, but his morally bankrupt cabal, does not! And pardons for criminals working on his behalf, will not stick!..:)
It occurs to me that the quid pro quo of the air palace is drill, baby, drill for Saudi Arabia, Qatar, etc—NOT the USA. The Orange Deranged One (TODO) is destroying US energy to open the door for OPEC—one of his two masters (the other being Vlad the Inveigler).
Yes! Never let a criminal opportunity go to waste. And speaking of Vlad, Trump's hatred for Ukraine, as petty as his windmill obsession, is not just because Putin makes him swoon, but because Ukraine refused to frame Biden for him.
The only way to get rid of these seditionists is to refuse to cooperate on anything, and call out his collaborators in Congress until a few of them flip. The lesson that giving them an inch just encourages them take more seems to be forgotten on a daily basis.
True, but we get less than 15% of our oil from the Persian Gulf, I mean Arabian Gulf. The Gulf’s oil is only significant in keeping global pricing in check. IMHO…:)
Even OPEC has had to ask its members to cut production and has idle capacity of over 5 million BPD!
There is simply far more than enough oil production globally compared to demand and both China and India are mass producing cheap EVs, as well.
Oil is a global commodity.
Trump is not going to save it by causing us to live longer in the dark ages while other nations surpass us in new energy innovations. We even export oil and gasoline and have for over 15 yrs. In addition, we have always known that it is limited and that diversifying is in our own best interests even if it were not for global warming which makes it even more important.
Hi Paul if you are taking requests I would be interested in a post about the pharmaceutical industry. Not just Trump's rambalings but on the complex interplay between government and industry in price setting.
So now renewables aren't 'manly'? I'll tell you what's not manly: contributing to global warming and its associated famine, drought, and species death because the view from your golf course offends your sense of proportion. I find myself wondering how Trump would have felt if those wind turbines had been painted gold.
Trump might be simple (in the sense of his ability to grasp complex ideas), but Senor Panza had it all over him in terms of his ability to see through grandiose delusions.
And equipped with a neon-framed 200 foot mirror to reflect Trump's magnificence. I have found myself reluctant to imagine him wearing a tartan and sporran, however. Can't imagine why.
And, the production from Eagle Ford shale in the Permian base is declining. The expected total recovery from wells is not what it used to be even as drillers use more expensive fracking techniques to increase the amount of oil produced. This means that the price of oil has to be higher than it used to be not lower in order to pay for the cost of the well and make a profit.
A good measure is rig count and active pumping stations. They decline as prices fall below the break even point. Once below, it makes no economic sense to continue to drill and pump. You lose money with every barrel. By getting foreign companies to flood our market with cheap oil, we put our domestic companies and workers out of business. But hey, we’ll have cheap oil for a while.
When I fill my vehicle, gas is not cheaper. I paid $3.29/g the other day. Fewer commercial trucks on the interstate, especially going from west to east and trains hauling containers are much shorter.
I paid less than $3.00/g last week. But, as was stated above, the price of fuel is the price of oil plus the cost of refining it. The refining cost isn't dropping; in fact, it's slowly increasing as the equipment ages, operating costs increase, and refineries close.
Texas Tribune points out that tariffs on steel increase the cost of drilling equipment, making new wells economically impossible. Just another unforeseen consequence, and foreseeing consequences is a prime marker of intelligence.
Donald doen't think about how things will work, only about how they'll play. Biden's close to the opposite. Since we suck now, Trump's in the White House.
I knew a petrochemical engineer who got laid off when the prices dropped in Texas. When they hired him back they needed fewer workers because the oil companies automated production.
Regardless, I have read that the Saudi cost of production per barrel is about $12. Artifice from OPEC and other large producers is why the price of gasoline is still high. They try to keep the price low enough so that people keep driving. However, if they raise the price too high, drivers will cut back on consumption. They continue to search for the sweet spot price. However, using oil as a political weapon is a part of OPEC’s chicanery.
OPEC could destroy our producers in a couple of months by flooding the market. Trump and OPEC colluded at the end of his first term to limit production to recover from the pandemic. Then when Biden got in they reduced production to the extent that Biden had to tap the strategic reserve. The repressive OPEC cartel prefers Trump because he is easy to manipulate evidenced by the $400 million jet bribe.
Chris Hayes had on an oil analyst who called Biden "The greatest oil trader in history" for his use of the SPR. Everybody bitching about Biden had money in their pocket due to it. Good idea to scale up the SPR,actually, and actively trade to control oil prices. Why should Saudi have all the power?
IIRC, FTC or DOJ has an ongoing case charging US fracker for collusion with Saudi/OPEC during this period to hold down production (expect that to go away). Yes, they can't afford to "drill, baby, drill" below a certain price. They learned that under Obama. Saudi production cuts Trump got during Covid were at their behest, iiirc.
Yeah, put this down as yet another Biden achievement he never got any credit for at the time. I don't know, I feel like "U.S. president successfully undercuts OPEC for the benefit of U.S. consumers" should've been a bigger news story, but of course we all know what kind of stories the news wants to tell.
I think the biggest story of the last 50 years is the goal-line stand of fossil fuels. In this epic, existential battle, people like Koch brother(s), Putin, the Bushes, Joe Manchin, and the Saudi royal family play for the same team--though, as with Trump and Putin in '16, there may not be a memorandum of understanding reflecting the arrangement. The overall strategy over those decades has been to attack the notion of climate change by attacking the component parts of science: scientific method, the theory of truth, and even meaning itself. It's no wonder that these people are now attacking due process, the "theory" and practice of juridical truth.
I read a theory on another blog years ago that fossil fuels are *the* single biggest factor in the rise of far-right authoritarian movements over the last half-century - movement conservatism (now basically fascism) in America, Putinism in Russia, and Saudi-backed Wahhabism in the Islamic world, all fall into the "reactionary authoritarians funded by fossil fuel money" category.
Not sure what I think of it, but there's definitely something there.
One way I think of it is as a Manicheistic duality of Old Sunlight and New Sunlight: fossil fuel is sunlight that has become trapped under the ground; New Sunlight is solar, wind, and wave.*
>government income is deeply reliant on the export of oil and natural gas,
>economic and political power are highly concentrated in an elite minority, and
>political institutions are weak and unaccountable, and corruption is widespread.
Countries often described as petrostates include Algeria, Cameroon, Chad, Ecuador, Indonesia, Iran, Kazakhstan, Libya, Mexico, Nigeria, Oman, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Venezuela.
Norway is one of the few major oil and gas producers to actually enhance its society and institutions thanks to petroleum wealth.
Extraction-based economies in general seem to be pretty bad for liberal democratic values. They discourage creativity, they discourage solidarity, they encourage looter mentality, they encourage zero-sum thinking. In that sort of economy, the priority isn't finding new ways to create wealth: you've already found the wealth, by stumbling onto it like a pirate finding a chest of buried gold. Instead, the emphasis becomes all about you're going to hang on to the wealth, and how you're going to make sure you have to share it with as few people as possible. That's not the stuff liberal democracies are made of, it's a recipe for kleptocracy and dictatorship.
Most countries with extraction-based economies were poor countries that were colonized by and looted by western nations. One cannot fault them for following the recipe in the cookbook they were given.
Segued from messing up as a baseball owner to a billion dollar Middle East off-shore drilling license after his old man took care o Sadaam. "But...Hunter Biden.... . "
All that said, I'd take him back in a heartbeat right now.
On the money as usual. We put the early North Sea wells on production at 30,000 barrels per day or more. A fracked well produces nowhere near that amount and then declines quite quickly. Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana and other states that rely on oil incomes maybe in serious trouble. Remember Houston in the mid 80's when Ronald Reagan got the Saudis to flood the market...........
And
Drill Baby Drill will be repurposed from energy to the dental profession. When RFK takes fluoride out of drinking water, dentists will indeed be singing "Drill Baby Drill".
You buy a furnace for oil and gas heating. For electricity, you buy kilowatt hours from the utility over time. With solar panel systems and wind generators, you also buy equipment, but the electricity is free for decades.
We do have to acknowledge that the right has us dead-to-rights on one related issue.
I live in rural South Carolina, and when I go into my home on the hottest day of the year and turn on the lights, I only get one thing from my expensive LED bulbs: light.
But when my countless MAGA neighbors and relatives gp into their homes on that really hot day and turn on their incandescent bulbs, they get THREE THINGS; light, heat and air-conditioning!
People frequently tell me I need "emojis" to communicate sarcasm.
I tell them that if when I'm reading, I come across an example of such a thing in the writings of Swift, de Cervantes, Twain, Wilde or Vonnegut, then I'll be happy to comply.
In a previous life, was responsible for a largish HVAC and power generation system, as Engineer on a casino riverboat. 700+ slot machines give off a lot od light and heat!
I live in an area of natural gas production. During Trump 1, 38 shops were closed (not sure the total number but many if not most were for lease). Under the Biden Administration most of those shops recovered with oil/gas operators but not all. Technology has reduced employment in the sector. My hubby had a business in which he repaired various equipment (now retired) used in energy production, especially those moving drilling rigs, compressors, and workover rigs. These businesses were far more busy under Biden than Trump even with Covid and especially once the economy opened back up. It sounds like these small but very profitable rig moving businesses may be in for a slow summer and fall. When a drilling rig is moved on location, those rigs drill a number of wells.
How about the doll quota by the guy who was given an economy that according to the Economist was the “envy of the world” with the lowest unemployment & highest growth rate since Clinton handed a booming economy & disappearing deficit to W: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHYH_DaL7Es
Imagine an applicant for US citizenship being asked if the President swore an oath to uphold the Constitution answering no…
Left out of this thoughtful analysis is the extent to which we will need to produce more energy (specifically electricity) in order to continue making advances in AI due to the sheer cost of computation. If an AI future turns out to be less energy intensive than some are expecting, we might see real reductions in fossil fuel prices. At least as long as we propose policies that do not hamstring renewables and’s the development of new technology to enhance the efficiency of the grid.
Oh for sure. And that’s not going to be cheap or easy in the short run. So start spending the time and money on the grid now rather than other energy related investments
Well, you can move your usage to the area in which the power is generated. A historical example would be building Oak Ridge near several hydroelectric dams during and after WWII.
Several reasons why Trump may want to see oil prices go down:
1. lower oil price is reflected at the gasoline pump, which voters see every day
2. fuel prices are part of daily household costs; inflation gets lower with lower fuel prices (to compensate for increased costs of household products due to tariffs)
3. Canada cannot make money when prices are below $60/barrel. As a big exporter to the US, lower prices can perhaps force Canada back to the negotiation table.
4. Russia needs $85/barrel to pay for its governmental expenses (and this was prior to Ukraine), forcing Putin to rethink his economics.
Russia and the Saudis conspired to collapse US domestic oil production under Trump 1 and that admin was fine with it. The US oil guys thought that current Sec Wright was “their guy” and would protect their interests this time around. Silly them.
Trump was primarily installed by SA (who actually bought Twitter as Musk’s insane toy, people?). Puppet Trump works for a variety of owners. The MAGA hat clowns aren’t among that ownership club.
“Similarly, the Biden administration was full of woke environmentalists who believe in the global warming hoax, so they must have crippled energy production — even though America in the Biden years was, for the first time in generations, producing more energy than it consumed:”
Not only this professor, but most (70%) of the oil we do drill and produce, isn’t compatible with most of our refineries, or the cost of transport from Alaska, makes it cheaper to sell to the Asian market.
Another problem with the cost of production are the refinery bottlenecks. When prices sink too low, our refineries lose money and some of them close for good, as was the case when COVID hit; we lost four refineries which never came back during the short time we experienced a deflationary period.
Additionally, we currently have approximately 132 refineries in the US, with about 20% accounting for more than 50% of our overall production. This is down from 254 in 1982. And all of them operate 24/7 using 1970’s technology. We haven’t built a new plant since the 80’s, and should a major refinery suffer a catastrophic accident, it could send gas prices up exponentially, regardless if global oil prices are at $60 or $20 a barrel.
The recurring theme I’m noticing with all aspects of the Trump administration is the lack of urgency in replacing our aging infrastructure, and this is certainly in alignment with an empire on the decline. And with Trump in power, our possible status as the world’s largest economic and military superpower, is not only in doubt, but becoming inevitable. IMHO…:)
I would add that record oil production never meant independence from imports, because our refineries are set up to rotate between different grades of oil from those we produce domestically. Record oil *exports* may have been going out, but *imports* were still coming in, because that's what we have the capacity to refine.
Precisely why US imports ca. 4million bbl/day of Canadian crude, shipped to Gulf refineries for processing.
Is there a tariff on this oil?
10%. Alberta Premier Danielle Smith talked him down from 25.
Exactly
me too!
JosephZeigler.substack.com
Exactly, foreign crude from Saudi has flooded our market. With light crude the processing in California is keeping their economy thriving.
I don't understand your point or your facts.
JosephZeigler.substack.com
Study the oil market... Some is "sour" (= acidic), others are "sweet".. Venezuela produces sour crude, Texas and North Slope are sweet... The Gulf of Mexico produces Both in varying quantities. Canadian tar sands are very sour...
Each refinery is built for X capacity and Y grade of sweetness. If you have available capacity your task is to locate and deliver matching crude supply.
Now, do that for economical production. And if THAT pipeline breaks...
Is sour crude refined at a higher temperature with less product per barrel?
Exactly..:)
Very good! I sure would like you writing for my stack.
JosephZeigler.substack.com
Thank you, I’ll check it out…:)
Hi Robert,
As you know, I run a Substack—JosephZeigler.substack.com. It’s where I vent, reflect, and try to make sense of things. I always feel better after a post—writing helps. It clears the head, sharpens the thoughts, and occasionally gets a comment or two from someone equally baffled by the world.
I’ve noticed you haven’t posted on your own Substack, but your comments? They’re sharp, insightful, and often more compelling than many of the posts I’ve seen—mine included. That’s why I’m reaching out.
I’m a confirmed Trump critic—no surprise there—and I wrestle with whether I’ll ever truly understand or forgive the folks who voted for him. But I believe in dialogue, not dogma. If you’ve got a take, a reply, or something you've been itching to say, I’d love to give you space to say it.
No one here gets paid to write—not yet, anyway—but it's a lot of fun. And sometimes it’s exactly the kind of thing that helps us feel a little less powerless.
I’ve got degrees in engineering and economics, I write books, and I try to ground what I say in research. But mainly, I’m just an old guy doing what I can with the tools I’ve got left.
Think it over. Might be good. Might even be fun.
Best,
Joe
p.s. This interface is awkward. Joe@ArrakisPublishing.com
I went to your page, and I didn’t see your newsletter. Can you only access it going through the internet instead of the app? I also subscribed and will check out your columns later.
And thank you, some comments are good, others not so much, but I try. That said, I also have a degree in economics and history, so I will enjoy the conversation.
Thanks again, and have a great week…:)
A person would have to be crazy to click on a link like that.
JosephZeigler.substack.com
Yes, but that was no reason for Trump to not throw another key GOP constituency under the bus. Between the drop in oil prices he arranged with OPEC and the tariff's increase to their operating expenses, it'll be a miracle to see any oil drillers in business by the end of the year.
It's worse than that. Even if we had the refineries, we have tied our own hands in terms of domestic shipments of oil and gas between US ports with the Jones Act. We won't be building any new pipelines, trains, or compliant barges and tankers in the remainder or Trump's term, the lead times are longer than that. I don't know how much spare capacity the existing transport network might have, but I'm confident it's not enough to replace imports, considering there's not even enough compliant spare capacity after localized natural disasters.
The part of Keystone that already existed is more than sufficient to move current production of oil down to the coast for refining and export. Oil moved through a second leg (the part that was cancelled) would have mostly been sent to the gulf to be shipped overseas and these days there is more than sufficient production.
https://www.nrdc.org/stories/what-keystone-xl-pipeline#impact
"The proposed Keystone XL extension actually comprised two segments. The first, a southern leg, had already been completed and now runs between Cushing, Oklahoma, and Port Arthur, Texas."
We actually export both oil and gasoline and became net exporters way back between 2009 and 2011 due to newer fracking technology and increased energy efficiency.
Gasoline: The new big U.S. export
By Steve Hargreaves @CNNMoney December 5, 2011: 1:01 PM ET
https://money.cnn.com/2011/12/05/news/economy/gasoline_export/index.htm
So, McCain's "Drill Baby Drill" became "old hat" not long after the 2008 election since production was already skyrocketing.
The largest increase in production was under Obama, not because of him, but because of new fracking technology. Also, new record levels were reached under Biden.
https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=WCRFPUS2&f=W
There is no actual "War on oil!"
That is 100% a GOP lie and myth used to try to win elections, just look at the graph above from eia.
This is because presidents do NOT control oil production!
We are not a socialist country that controls private industries!
Yet, politicians campaign like this is the case.
These are independent companies acting in their own interests.
The world is glutted with oil at the moment, thus the lower prices. Companies have no incentive to invest to drill at the moment, because supply is outpacing demand due in part to EVs that are being produced globally. Both China and India produce inexpensive EVs.
The most likely scenario is that demand will continue to decline and at a minimum level off.
This!
Keystone is largely a Canadian project to move tar sand oil. Much is currently shipped by rail to NJ for refining because the pipeline wasn't full length.
The pipeline was for Canada.. so they could easily export (instead of shipping via the Great Lakes) to the REST of the world (not the US)
Tar sands are the most environmental damaging way to extract oil! Canada seems unconcerned. Environmental groups seem indifferent to this fact. I guess wealth trumps all else.
The LNG market was turbocharged by Putin’s asinine invasion of Ukraine…and so now the natural gas in the tar sands can be piped to a port and exported as LNG.
Thanks to Trump the Canadians perhaps want to export LNG directly and cut US as the middle man?
I live in Southern Oregon. I believe that most of our fuel supply is trucked in from Eugene, approximately 190 miles give or take. When Trump came in, regular gas at Costco was 3.10/gal and 3.16 at Fred Meyer. It has been rising ever since, around 3.70 now at Freddy's. Per barrel costs for oil I believe are now around $60 or below.
Can anyone explain why the pump price here has been rising consistently during the past 3 1/2 months.
We saw an increase in CA, as well, about a month ago, so maybe a flip to summer blend and/or a refinery issue. Since then, somewhat consistent, but I will see when I am out today. I know Oregon switches to a summer blend too but AAA shows prices about the same over this last month.
I do not know if the Canadian tariffs are causing any issues. Hard to keep up with that.
That was expected to cause some increases in prices. Hard to know what has gone into effect or not.
"How Trump’s Tariffs On Mexico And Canada Could Impact U.S. Gas Prices"
By Robert Rapier, Senior Contributor. Robert Rapier is a chemical engineer covering the energy sector.
Mar 04, 2025, 10:39am EST
https://www.forbes.com/sites/rrapier/2025/03/04/how-trumps-tariffs-on-mexico-and-canada-could-impact-us-gas-prices/
Prices have been inching up before the grifter was in office. All the while big oil receives subsidies. Why in the heck should we be paying these companies, that make insane profits (look at the numbers during Covid) AND pay them subsidies.
Thank you for this information. I had no idea how this worked. Frankly, I don't think anyone knows how this all works and that's the way they designed it. Corporations run this game.
Most do not know how it works because it has been used as a chip for politicians who have distorted it all. This also confuses the press who simply then too often repeat the political talking points (because it is easier) which are largely nonsense.
I simply started digging into it around 2011 looking up some of the GOP claims leading up to the 2012 election and started on fact check sites. This then gave me links to more resources.
Oil is a global commodity and its price is largely determined by global supply and demand (not just what we do here at home).
Then, the price of gas is largely influenced by this cost of oil globally+ refining costs.
"The Energy Information Administration (EIA) reports that oil prices are determined by global supply and demand, influenced by various factors like global economic conditions and geopolitical events. While global prices are the primary driver, local factors also play a role, such as refining costs and local market conditions."
OPEC will be pumping more oil this year. Watch what happens to the fracking boys start losing profits
Thank you for this information. It's a world "not" running on empty.
This man has the info without the propaganda!
FYI, there is a terminal in Roseburg.
Agreed on all points. Although, the Keystone pipeline won't help you get more oil out from net exporters like Houston, Corpus Christi, and Valdez to net importers like LA/Long Beach, NY/NJ, and other domestic destinations.
The cure for high commodity prices is…high commodity prices. So the Bush/Cheney administration failed to solve the energy crisis and their failure is what made fracking economical…none of their policies factored into developing fracking which they believed could never be economical. A key component of Bush’s solution was Palin’s natural gas pipeline to the lower 48…fracking made that obsolete and it was canceled. So believe it or not Bush’s solution to the energy crisis also involved importing LNG from Qatar and so even though we’ve never imported LNG from Qatar it was our capital that helped build Qatar’s LNG export infrastructure.
Qatar's LNG terminals has saved much of the EU after the 2022 Russian attack on Ukraine and the subsequent boycott of Russian LNG. Even the US is exporting LNG big time to the EU now.
Yep, Biden played the Ukrainian perfectly and strengthened and expanded NATO while making America energy dominant. And then Republicans pretended those things weren’t important even though they nominated McCain and Romney. And every day Trump is getting closer to continuing all of Biden’s policies which makes sense because Biden did a great job in a very turbulent 4 years…if Trump increases the top rate to 39.6% then we are getting Biden even though a Republican is president! Although I doubt Republicans in Congress give Trump that even though that and the Fed decreasing interest rates gets us to 3% deficit/GDP ratio in 2026.
That's a common problem with protectionist policies as we are about to find out.
JosephZeigler.substack.com
Excellent points and well said…:)
(the Jones act has been suspended in times of emergency... That'll repeat if bad things happen)
This used to be true. Not so much since it was amended in 2021 to make waivers harder to grant and much more restrictive in what they could authorize, or for how long.
Either way, Charles Koch makes out like a bandit.
Yep as his dark money has been fueling all of this for years.
Some refineries have been expanded.
There is also neither an oil or gasoline shortage and we export both oil and gasoline. In fact excess production compared to supply globally is causing lower prices for a barrel of oil. OPEC had to cut production several times under Biden to boost prices to keep them profitable.
In addition, oil production in the USA has more than doubled, nearly tripled, in just over the last 15 years!
Most of this happened under Dem administrations, as well, because these are private companies doing what is in their own best interests based on global demand and because fracking technology increased production.
Presidents have little to nothing do with oil production because we are not a socialist country.
Weekly oil production in the USA is listed in the graph below going back decades.
The graph will knock your socks off!
https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=WCRFPUS2&f=W
In fact, there is so much oil on global markets that the price has dropped. EVs and other alternatives for transportation are not just being produced here, but in India and China, as well.
True, it’s excess production, but also sluggish global growth…:)
And don't forget that both China and India are producing cheap EVs on a large scale.
China actually has made huge strides in reducing emissions in its transportation sector.
OPEC was cutting again even as the economy grew in recent years, due to excess oil causing lower prices, but the projected sluggish economy now makes things worse.
I am not happy about a sluggish economy, but I am glad that demand is declining.
Sadly, it's not just trump. Republicans have resisted taxes and infrastructure for fifty years. So, here we are...
JosephZeigler.substack.com
It is a pleasure to read or listen to intelligent conversations without prejudice or propaganda involved when people who converse know the subject! And to compare it to what is going on in our capital and on say, Fox tv is simply scary— the country is run by thieves who lie for a living and you can’t convince any maga members that Joe Biden’s America was prosperous and successful nation respected and appreciated and admired in the world everywhere and look at us now! We are in a free fall and until and unless a respected leader or a group of leaders starts leading we are going to keep falling and it’s a bottomless pit…,I pray for America and its people but many of Americans hate it because they feel that they deserve more, well with trump you will get even less and he could not care any less! Good luck to you!
Thank you and well said. However, as Yogi Berra once said, “it ain’t over, till it’s over!”
These are scary times, and I fear for my nieces and nephews. We were a nation on the decline, but Trump is an accelerant of the worst kind; more aptly put, he’s a one man walking, talking plague!
I often wonder how Trump got elected, and it literally took a village. A corrupt SCOTUS that slow rolled two criminal cases and carved out an unconstitutional immunity clause in the process. A complicit MSM that sane washed the guy, and billionaires who bent a knee a least a year before the election.
Not to mention, Musk and Zuckerberg using nefarious algorithms to push or suppress content on their platforms, and allowing disinformation campaigns, especially executed by foreign actors, to run rampant and with impunity on their platforms; all in the name of free speech.
And of course, there’s Biden, who never should have run again; instead, he should have honored the oath he promised; passing the baton to the next generation. Yet here we are!
I know our future looks bleak, but we will eventually persevere. Just stay strong and get ready to fight back when the opportunity presents itself. However, I do agree we have a leadership vacuum in the opposition, and very few are stepping up to the plate. Therefore, we don’t wait for them to lead. Groups are forming at the grass roots level, while lawyers file lawsuits, and people from all walks of life are joining the opposition.
Remember, you can’t lose, if you never quit. Part of the reason for our predicament is the fact that the religious fascists who are running the government today, never quit. They’ve lost hundreds of battles but not the war, because while the rest of us assumed they were down for the count, they never give up, or ever cease to amaze.
They’ve lost hundreds of battles, yet they just grow stronger, like a really dangerous fungus. These people are literal “sheeple-zombies” who are as ruthless as they are relentless.
That said, we just need to take a few plays out of their playbook, and find their vulnerabilities, for which there is no shortage of supply. And when the time comes, we pounce!
At least that’s my story, and I’m sticking to it. Have a great evening…:)
Is trump a moron or a Russian agent? Both?
JosephZeigler.substack.com
Whether he’s an asset, agent, useless idiot, or just an ordinary imbecile with delusions of grandeur; does it really matter at this point?
Bottom line: Russia couldn’t have dreamt up a better chaos agent, who destroys everything he touches, even if they wanted to. His is Russia and China’s wet dream.
Trump has singlehandedly destroyed our democracy, alliances, economy, rule of law. National Security Apparatus, education, NIH, CDC, USAID, DOJ and FBI…….and the list goes on!
And worse, while our economic and military decline is real, Trump just accelerated it, and made it inevitable. Need I say more?….:)
An asset or agent might be impeached more easily than an ordinary imbecile with delusions of grandeur. Maybe it’s a toss-up, impeachment or 25th amendment? Some day over the rainbow. . .
True, but we’re dealing with a complicit GOP (impeachment), a cabinet filled with loyal lapdogs and sycophants (25th Amendment), and don’t even get me started with Bondi and Patel at Justice and the FBI, respectively.
My point: who’s exactly is going to prosecute Trump and MAGA? So good luck with that!….:)
And a bunch of enthusiastic Trump supporters in the white electorate. It comes down to them. They are the crux of the problem, not Trump or any other politician.
see what i mean
Almost certainly both. Okay, as to the "moron" part of the question, 100% cert.) Russian agent, about 97%.
My guess is that Trump is a moron, which makes him a useful idiot to anyone that he sympathizes with. Trump is a product of East Coast wise guys, guess what type of leaders he sympathizes with?
Very well said and written. Thank you
Thank you…:)
Is the reduction due to e-vehicles, upgrades to existing refineries? Certainly more vehicles on the road. There are fewer drilling rigs due to horizontal drilling no? Isn’t Canadian oil shipped to Louisiana for refining?
Yup, that’s why our two biggest oil importers are Canada and Mexico, respectively. The reduction has little to do with EV’s since as you’ve stated, we have more gas guzzling cars on the road than ever before.
Refineries are typically low profit margin businesses, that require lots of capital upgrades and repairs, and are extremely vulnerable to market conditions.
He's looting America. He's treating it like a leveraged buyout. No to improvement or investment. Everythink he can get his hands on turns into his money and his property.
100% agree, it’s a grift on a scale never seen before, and will continue to get worse.
We need to start kicking ass, and taking names, because when the dust settles, Trump has immunity, but his morally bankrupt cabal, does not! And pardons for criminals working on his behalf, will not stick!..:)
How about we use less oil?
JosephZeigler.substack.com
Danielle Smith likes to promote herself as being influential. But her one minute with DT did not produce anything.
It’s DT’s cronies realizing that taxing your own energy purchases is a losing strategy.
I don’t understand the last sentence, Mr Krugman. Does IMHO clarify? What does IMHO mean?
In my humble opinion…:)
It occurs to me that the quid pro quo of the air palace is drill, baby, drill for Saudi Arabia, Qatar, etc—NOT the USA. The Orange Deranged One (TODO) is destroying US energy to open the door for OPEC—one of his two masters (the other being Vlad the Inveigler).
The worst move the O&G industry leaders have ever made is supporting this Regime.
TODO…good one. Chaos as he destroys while stealing everything he can.
Yes! Never let a criminal opportunity go to waste. And speaking of Vlad, Trump's hatred for Ukraine, as petty as his windmill obsession, is not just because Putin makes him swoon, but because Ukraine refused to frame Biden for him.
The only way to get rid of these seditionists is to refuse to cooperate on anything, and call out his collaborators in Congress until a few of them flip. The lesson that giving them an inch just encourages them take more seems to be forgotten on a daily basis.
True, but we get less than 15% of our oil from the Persian Gulf, I mean Arabian Gulf. The Gulf’s oil is only significant in keeping global pricing in check. IMHO…:)
I didn’t say it makes sense, just cents for TODO!
I was joking. You never heard the phrase “we lose money in every sale, but we make it up in volume?” It makes no sense at all…:)
From Paul Krugman's piece, I got that American energy independence is their target, just like during Trump 1.0.
Even OPEC has had to ask its members to cut production and has idle capacity of over 5 million BPD!
There is simply far more than enough oil production globally compared to demand and both China and India are mass producing cheap EVs, as well.
Oil is a global commodity.
Trump is not going to save it by causing us to live longer in the dark ages while other nations surpass us in new energy innovations. We even export oil and gasoline and have for over 15 yrs. In addition, we have always known that it is limited and that diversifying is in our own best interests even if it were not for global warming which makes it even more important.
The oil price drop is related to the increase of production of OPEC+
https://www.ft.com/content/2ee02b71-320b-4ecd-9494-be2cd5a31622
Hi Paul if you are taking requests I would be interested in a post about the pharmaceutical industry. Not just Trump's rambalings but on the complex interplay between government and industry in price setting.
Yes; That's a dynamic worthy of Paul's eyes; Thence how it trickles to the average consumer.
Including why the Australian government using free market negotiation of bulk buys to drive down our costs is somehow not in the spirit of capitalism
So now renewables aren't 'manly'? I'll tell you what's not manly: contributing to global warming and its associated famine, drought, and species death because the view from your golf course offends your sense of proportion. I find myself wondering how Trump would have felt if those wind turbines had been painted gold.
Trump fighting windmills - why does this remind me of Don Quixotte? Come to think of it, his sidekick (Sancho Panza) was also a simple peasant.
Trump might be simple (in the sense of his ability to grasp complex ideas), but Senor Panza had it all over him in terms of his ability to see through grandiose delusions.
Poor old Sancho was smarter than Don Quixote and Trumpkopf combined.
Leigh it has to do with hoses.
Not sufficient - they have to be gold plated.
And equipped with a neon-framed 200 foot mirror to reflect Trump's magnificence. I have found myself reluctant to imagine him wearing a tartan and sporran, however. Can't imagine why.
Probably because he'd be more at home in an SS uniform.
Painting them gold wouldn't have been enough. They would've had to be gold plated, if not solid gold.
Gold plated but he'll say they're solid gold and the IRS will "randomly" audit anyone who claims they aren't.
And, the production from Eagle Ford shale in the Permian base is declining. The expected total recovery from wells is not what it used to be even as drillers use more expensive fracking techniques to increase the amount of oil produced. This means that the price of oil has to be higher than it used to be not lower in order to pay for the cost of the well and make a profit.
A good measure is rig count and active pumping stations. They decline as prices fall below the break even point. Once below, it makes no economic sense to continue to drill and pump. You lose money with every barrel. By getting foreign companies to flood our market with cheap oil, we put our domestic companies and workers out of business. But hey, we’ll have cheap oil for a while.
True, but in the MAGAverse, it’s okay to lose money on every barrel sold, because they’ll make it up in volume…:)
Oh like in casinos! If you lose money on one build another to make up for it. Geez only a stupid person wouldn't understand that.
At least until the wells run dry.
When I fill my vehicle, gas is not cheaper. I paid $3.29/g the other day. Fewer commercial trucks on the interstate, especially going from west to east and trains hauling containers are much shorter.
By comparison, I pay about $9 a month to charge my electric car. Just sayin’.
NICE... But that's highly dependent on your terrain, milage and electric company rates.
My one time employer moved to PA because power was cheaper than NJ. And much of NY is even higher
I paid less than $3.00/g last week. But, as was stated above, the price of fuel is the price of oil plus the cost of refining it. The refining cost isn't dropping; in fact, it's slowly increasing as the equipment ages, operating costs increase, and refineries close.
By using cheap foreign oil first, we have "reserves" for the future.
Think of it as a petroleum Retirement Account. The rest of the world runs dry first.
(Remember during the pandemic, when they couldn't give oil away?)
How does that help? Just another reason for war
Explain... Who? Where? Why?
Texas Tribune points out that tariffs on steel increase the cost of drilling equipment, making new wells economically impossible. Just another unforeseen consequence, and foreseeing consequences is a prime marker of intelligence.
Donald doen't think about how things will work, only about how they'll play. Biden's close to the opposite. Since we suck now, Trump's in the White House.
Exactly my thought. It’s all performance with this guy, all ‘style’, no ‘substance’.
I knew a petrochemical engineer who got laid off when the prices dropped in Texas. When they hired him back they needed fewer workers because the oil companies automated production.
Regardless, I have read that the Saudi cost of production per barrel is about $12. Artifice from OPEC and other large producers is why the price of gasoline is still high. They try to keep the price low enough so that people keep driving. However, if they raise the price too high, drivers will cut back on consumption. They continue to search for the sweet spot price. However, using oil as a political weapon is a part of OPEC’s chicanery.
OPEC could destroy our producers in a couple of months by flooding the market. Trump and OPEC colluded at the end of his first term to limit production to recover from the pandemic. Then when Biden got in they reduced production to the extent that Biden had to tap the strategic reserve. The repressive OPEC cartel prefers Trump because he is easy to manipulate evidenced by the $400 million jet bribe.
Chris Hayes had on an oil analyst who called Biden "The greatest oil trader in history" for his use of the SPR. Everybody bitching about Biden had money in their pocket due to it. Good idea to scale up the SPR,actually, and actively trade to control oil prices. Why should Saudi have all the power?
IIRC, FTC or DOJ has an ongoing case charging US fracker for collusion with Saudi/OPEC during this period to hold down production (expect that to go away). Yes, they can't afford to "drill, baby, drill" below a certain price. They learned that under Obama. Saudi production cuts Trump got during Covid were at their behest, iiirc.
Yeah, put this down as yet another Biden achievement he never got any credit for at the time. I don't know, I feel like "U.S. president successfully undercuts OPEC for the benefit of U.S. consumers" should've been a bigger news story, but of course we all know what kind of stories the news wants to tell.
I think the biggest story of the last 50 years is the goal-line stand of fossil fuels. In this epic, existential battle, people like Koch brother(s), Putin, the Bushes, Joe Manchin, and the Saudi royal family play for the same team--though, as with Trump and Putin in '16, there may not be a memorandum of understanding reflecting the arrangement. The overall strategy over those decades has been to attack the notion of climate change by attacking the component parts of science: scientific method, the theory of truth, and even meaning itself. It's no wonder that these people are now attacking due process, the "theory" and practice of juridical truth.
I read a theory on another blog years ago that fossil fuels are *the* single biggest factor in the rise of far-right authoritarian movements over the last half-century - movement conservatism (now basically fascism) in America, Putinism in Russia, and Saudi-backed Wahhabism in the Islamic world, all fall into the "reactionary authoritarians funded by fossil fuel money" category.
Not sure what I think of it, but there's definitely something there.
One way I think of it is as a Manicheistic duality of Old Sunlight and New Sunlight: fossil fuel is sunlight that has become trapped under the ground; New Sunlight is solar, wind, and wave.*
*With wave-power, gravity helps out.
Democracy has a tough time in petrostates. Venezuela is a prime example. See
https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/venezuela-crisis
Characteristics:
>government income is deeply reliant on the export of oil and natural gas,
>economic and political power are highly concentrated in an elite minority, and
>political institutions are weak and unaccountable, and corruption is widespread.
Countries often described as petrostates include Algeria, Cameroon, Chad, Ecuador, Indonesia, Iran, Kazakhstan, Libya, Mexico, Nigeria, Oman, Qatar, Russia, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Venezuela.
Norway is one of the few major oil and gas producers to actually enhance its society and institutions thanks to petroleum wealth.
Extraction-based economies in general seem to be pretty bad for liberal democratic values. They discourage creativity, they discourage solidarity, they encourage looter mentality, they encourage zero-sum thinking. In that sort of economy, the priority isn't finding new ways to create wealth: you've already found the wealth, by stumbling onto it like a pirate finding a chest of buried gold. Instead, the emphasis becomes all about you're going to hang on to the wealth, and how you're going to make sure you have to share it with as few people as possible. That's not the stuff liberal democracies are made of, it's a recipe for kleptocracy and dictatorship.
Most countries with extraction-based economies were poor countries that were colonized by and looted by western nations. One cannot fault them for following the recipe in the cookbook they were given.
Yes, indeed. Thanks for saying that.
Remember what they said about G.W. Bush: "Born on third base and thought he hit a triple."
Segued from messing up as a baseball owner to a billion dollar Middle East off-shore drilling license after his old man took care o Sadaam. "But...Hunter Biden.... . "
All that said, I'd take him back in a heartbeat right now.
That's very good. Thanks.
On the money as usual. We put the early North Sea wells on production at 30,000 barrels per day or more. A fracked well produces nowhere near that amount and then declines quite quickly. Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana and other states that rely on oil incomes maybe in serious trouble. Remember Houston in the mid 80's when Ronald Reagan got the Saudis to flood the market...........
And
Drill Baby Drill will be repurposed from energy to the dental profession. When RFK takes fluoride out of drinking water, dentists will indeed be singing "Drill Baby Drill".
80s joke: "What's the difference between a bird and a Texas oilman? A bird can still make a deposit on a new Mercedes."
You buy a furnace for oil and gas heating. For electricity, you buy kilowatt hours from the utility over time. With solar panel systems and wind generators, you also buy equipment, but the electricity is free for decades.
We do have to acknowledge that the right has us dead-to-rights on one related issue.
I live in rural South Carolina, and when I go into my home on the hottest day of the year and turn on the lights, I only get one thing from my expensive LED bulbs: light.
But when my countless MAGA neighbors and relatives gp into their homes on that really hot day and turn on their incandescent bulbs, they get THREE THINGS; light, heat and air-conditioning!
And Trump calls them "uneducated"!
Energy to create the heat inside, energy to move it outside.
Strictly speaking, of course, your incsndescents just convert amps to heat.
People frequently tell me I need "emojis" to communicate sarcasm.
I tell them that if when I'm reading, I come across an example of such a thing in the writings of Swift, de Cervantes, Twain, Wilde or Vonnegut, then I'll be happy to comply.
But I thank you for the info, and for your time.
I didn't miss it, actually. Just pointing out expenditure on imcandescents is made twice.
Oh, my!
I hope that's doesn't make me so (previously) uneducated that Trump might love me!
In a previous life, was responsible for a largish HVAC and power generation system, as Engineer on a casino riverboat. 700+ slot machines give off a lot od light and heat!
I'm with you foofaraw. Three fer's are good deals no matter watt anyone says.
That's exactly foofaraw's point.
"...even though the homicide rate in 2024 was close to a 65-year low:"
Ironically, it would be even lower - by a lot - if we passed sensible red flag laws.
//
"When I wrote about this at the time, I suggested that Trump was suffering from MAGA brain"
He wasn't suffering in the least - we were.
I live in an area of natural gas production. During Trump 1, 38 shops were closed (not sure the total number but many if not most were for lease). Under the Biden Administration most of those shops recovered with oil/gas operators but not all. Technology has reduced employment in the sector. My hubby had a business in which he repaired various equipment (now retired) used in energy production, especially those moving drilling rigs, compressors, and workover rigs. These businesses were far more busy under Biden than Trump even with Covid and especially once the economy opened back up. It sounds like these small but very profitable rig moving businesses may be in for a slow summer and fall. When a drilling rig is moved on location, those rigs drill a number of wells.
How about cuts for Vets & a $100 Million birthday parade of ("suckers & losers") for Donnie Bonespurs? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lSwrPaTWps
How about the doll quota by the guy who was given an economy that according to the Economist was the “envy of the world” with the lowest unemployment & highest growth rate since Clinton handed a booming economy & disappearing deficit to W: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHYH_DaL7Es
Imagine an applicant for US citizenship being asked if the President swore an oath to uphold the Constitution answering no…
I do not speak for my agency.
Left out of this thoughtful analysis is the extent to which we will need to produce more energy (specifically electricity) in order to continue making advances in AI due to the sheer cost of computation. If an AI future turns out to be less energy intensive than some are expecting, we might see real reductions in fossil fuel prices. At least as long as we propose policies that do not hamstring renewables and’s the development of new technology to enhance the efficiency of the grid.
The grid itself needs advancing.
Oh for sure. And that’s not going to be cheap or easy in the short run. So start spending the time and money on the grid now rather than other energy related investments
Well, you can move your usage to the area in which the power is generated. A historical example would be building Oak Ridge near several hydroelectric dams during and after WWII.
Several reasons why Trump may want to see oil prices go down:
1. lower oil price is reflected at the gasoline pump, which voters see every day
2. fuel prices are part of daily household costs; inflation gets lower with lower fuel prices (to compensate for increased costs of household products due to tariffs)
3. Canada cannot make money when prices are below $60/barrel. As a big exporter to the US, lower prices can perhaps force Canada back to the negotiation table.
4. Russia needs $85/barrel to pay for its governmental expenses (and this was prior to Ukraine), forcing Putin to rethink his economics.
Canada tar sands break even below 50(US)... Texas intermediate is at about 60.
Pushing our production Up to force Canadian prices down is self defeating
Russia and the Saudis conspired to collapse US domestic oil production under Trump 1 and that admin was fine with it. The US oil guys thought that current Sec Wright was “their guy” and would protect their interests this time around. Silly them.
Trump was primarily installed by SA (who actually bought Twitter as Musk’s insane toy, people?). Puppet Trump works for a variety of owners. The MAGA hat clowns aren’t among that ownership club.
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/05/12/trump-saudi-us-oil-industry-00332620