USA: oil exports

I was surprised to hear on the radio the other day that, due to decreased demand in a depressed economy, the USA actually is now exporting more gasoline than we import:

http://www.npr.org/2012/03/05/147992053/u-s-a-gas-exporter-for-first-time-in-more-than-50-years
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-02-29/u-s-was-net-oil-product-exporter-in-2011.html
http://www.hydrocarbonprocessing.com/Article/2988223/US-sees-lower-2011-oil-use-becomes-net-exporter.html
http://www.investorplace.com/2012/03/us-becomes-net-oil-product-exporter/ http://craigeisele.wordpress.com/2012/03/04/yes-it-is-true-the-usa-is-a-net-exporter-of-gasoline/
http://moneymorning.com/2012/01/04/oil-companies-big-winners-as-u-s-becomes-net-exporter-of-fuel/

Now, about those rising gas prices...

I was talking about this last night. The rising gas prices are due to oil being sold in a world market and therefore subject to lots of speculation/price gouging.

time to flounder the thread....

drill, baby, drill no longer makes a lot of sense

The gas prices have more to do with trading than anything else. The production argument has more to do with politics than anything else. And, uh, I'll leave it at that.

I would be amazed enough if the media even got the story accurate. Gas prices = politics.

It just floats around the sea until they can find the highest bidder. Kinda like seeing a clean, stock Crx floating around Ebay asking $10,000.

At some point, we are going to have to come up with a more comprehensive energy policy. Drilling, gas prices, all that crap is just a distraction.

mad_machine wrote: drill, baby, drill no longer makes a lot of sense

Agreed.

Anti-stance wrote:

mad_machine wrote: drill, baby, drill no longer makes a lot of sense

Agreed.

Implying that at one time it did?

fast_eddie_72 wrote:

Anti-stance wrote:

mad_machine wrote: drill, baby, drill no longer makes a lot of sense

Agreed.

Implying that at one time it did?

Yes it did when we were importing more than exporting. Simple supply side economics.

Drilling is still a good idea. Just don't pump it out. Cap the wells now and open them up later.That way when demand ramps up supply can be more quickly brought to market.

ThePhranc wrote: Drilling is still a good idea. Just don't pump it out. Cap the wells now and open them up later.That way when demand ramps up supply can be more quickly brought to market.

There is plenty of demand- thus the exports. Why would they cap the wells?

Domestic drilling only makes sense if the oil stays in US. Unless that happens, we're subject to global influences just like the rest of the world. Anyone know how to make that possible without violating the Constitution or creating a publically-owned energy company?

The irony is that politicians use prices as an election tool. We have some who claim drilling is the magic bullet. A few years ago we had a candidate blaming the guy in the White House for higher prices; now that same guy is President and says he has no control.

Politicians and voters = "dumb and dumberer".

fast_eddie_72 wrote:

ThePhranc wrote: Drilling is still a good idea. Just don't pump it out. Cap the wells now and open them up later.That way when demand ramps up supply can be more quickly brought to market.

There is plenty of demand- thus the exports. Why would they cap the wells?

To increase the price. Why else?

We can talk alternatives all we want. We would still have the top brass getting control with greed and powertrips making profits off the little guy.

Gasoline is not Crude Oil. When we import oil, we give our money to people that really don't have our best interest at heart. Our country needs to be energy independent, AGAIN, so that we don't have to rely on unstable parts of the world filled with shiny happy people to make sure that we can get to work so we can pay our mortgages. You can not conserve your way to that point. You can not wish your way to that point. We won't even touch the so-called alternative energy industry, which seems to be mainly a method to funnel tax dollars into Democrat politician pockets.

"We can't drill our way out of this problem." Yeah, how berkeleying stoopid is that? How else are you going to get oil?

Must ...resist ....temptation ....to.... flounder....

fast_eddie_72 wrote:

ThePhranc wrote: Drilling is still a good idea. Just don't pump it out. Cap the wells now and open them up later.That way when demand ramps up supply can be more quickly brought to market.

There is plenty of demand- thus the exports. Why would they cap the wells?

World supply can keep up with demand with out US exports. We have a glut that we are getting rid of not because its needed to meet demand.

You cap the wells now because the overflow of oil that would other wise be going out stays where it is until its needed. Since oil has more major price dictations beside just supply/demand flooding the market will not lower the price of oil significantly. Drilling and capping now leaves you with a shortened start up time when demand outpaces supply.

You always here about how drilling wont help now because it takes years to come on line. Pre-planning will help in 5 years when we need more supply given that the economy rebounds to the same levels it was at just a few years ago.

Dr. Hess wrote: Gasoline is not Crude Oil. When we import oil, we give our money to people that really don't have our best interest at heart. Our country needs to be energy independent, AGAIN, so that we don't have to rely on unstable parts of the world filled with shiny happy people to make sure that we can get to work so we can pay our mortgages. You can not conserve your way to that point. You can not wish your way to that point. We won't even touch the so-called alternative energy industry, which seems to be mainly a method to funnel tax dollars into Democrat politician pockets. "We can't drill our way out of this problem." Yeah, how berkeleying stoopid is that? How else are you going to get oil?

Physical importation of oil comes from Canada mostly. Not that much oil comes here from the Middle East or Africa. Its the fungability of the oil market that is the problem. If we paid directly to the nations that we actually import from instead of it all going into a giant worldwide pot prices would drop drastically, OPEC would become obsolete and speculation would have less of an impact.

You also need to consider that we import a lot of diesel from europe because our refineries can't meet our demand. Who remembers when diesel was cheaper than regular gas?

ThePhranc wrote: Physical importation of oil comes from Canada mostly. Not that much oil comes here from the Middle East or Africa. Its the fungability of the oil market that is the problem. If we paid directly to the nations that we actually import from instead of it all going into a giant worldwide pot prices would drop drastically, OPEC would become obsolete and speculation would have less of an impact.

Can you make this happen, please?

I think you all (except Hess) are missing something very important here:

We export more GASOLINE and oil products then we import! Not oil, or crude oil!!

Big difference! Last I looked the US uses something like 20 million barrels of oil of day and produces around 7 million.

This just mean we have more refining capacity then we currently need. We still get most of our crude oil from somewhere else (mostly Canada). But as noted, it IS a world market so it doesn't really mater where we get it from, still the same price.

The title of the thread should say Oil Product Exports, not Oil Exports. I am sure it was in unintentional mistake.

In reply to aircooled:

AHA! You are right. I just kind of glossed right over that.

ThePhranc wrote: Drilling is still a good idea. Just don't pump it out. Cap the wells now and open them up later.That way when demand ramps up supply can be more quickly brought to market.

And why would they do that? High demand coupled with short supply only puts MORE money in their pockets.

ThePhranc wrote: World supply can keep up with demand with out US exports. We have a glut that we are getting rid of not because its needed to meet demand.

No doubt. It would be better for the U.S. if we didn't export it. And, sure, there's no doubt that the rest of the world could easily keep up with the demand.

ThePhranc wrote: You cap the wells now because the overflow of oil that would other wise be going out stays where it is until its needed. Since oil has more major price dictations beside just supply/demand flooding the market will not lower the price of oil significantly. Drilling and capping now leaves you with a shortened start up time when demand outpaces supply.

Well, yes, that would be good for the U.S., but again, I ask, why would they cap the wells? Let me make that clearer- why would the oil companies cap the wells? It may be better for the U.S. but I don't see how it's better for the oil companies. Oil prices are pretty high right now. If anything I'd think they would want to pump as much as they could to cash in on the high price.

ThePhranc wrote: You always here about how drilling wont help now because it takes years to come on line. Pre-planning will help in 5 years when we need more supply given that the economy rebounds to the same levels it was at just a few years ago.

What I always hear is that somehow the government is preventing oil companies from drilling, yet they have loads of places they already have rights to that they have yet to drill.

As I said above, the reason is almost certainly economic. If they would make more money drilling those sites I'm sure they would. But clearly, U.S. oil companies are competitive on the world market or they wouldn't be exporting oil. So there doesn't seem to be excessive government regulation. In fact, as we all know, the government subsidizes the oil companies in the U.S. So it would seem that they're being treated well enough to do just fine for themselves.

What you're suggesting is that they take action that is in the best interest of the country, rather than in the best interest of the company. I can only think of a couple of ways that could happen, and they both involve the government becoming involved in how oil companies do business. If that's what you're suggesting, by all means, I support you. As reliant as we are on oil, and as much as it influences our foreign policy, especially considering that we all subsidize the industry, it seems more than reasonable that we would make some demands that they operate in our best interest. But that's an unpopular opinion politically. I don't see it happening any time soon.

In reply to fast_eddie_72:

Sounds like an endorsement for some form of domestic nationalization.

IIRC, over 90% of today's oil supply originates from nationalized sources and we have escalating prices. If so, government = corporations = both are greedy and evil = little would likely change if the US followed suit.

De-privatization is a risky political idea but it would have the benefit of taking the heat off business and putting it on government. Some would argue it should be there anyway.