Gas Prices
Gas prices for regular to super continue to remain at high levels across the US. All prices are, at least, at or near $3.00 a gallon. With the summer driving season upon us, and the increase in travel be car, gas prices will remain high (if not higher) until after Labor Day.
Many choose to blame the oil companies for limiting supply and raising oil prices unnecessarily. Federal reviews of high gas prices after Hurricane Katrina have shown that oil companies used strategies to increase gasoline supplies after Katrina to keep prices from skyrocketing. The fact is that oil supplies being pumped are at their maximum from all oil producers worldwide at this time. Oil demand is also at an all time high with the emergence of India and China's need for oil to 'fuel' their ever expanding economies. Nigerian oil supplies have been cut by 30% due to attacks by armed groups trying to force the government to share oil revenue with all the citizens of Nigeria.
Oil prices are, in fact, set by buyers at the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX). Crude oil prices have been at or above $70 a barrel due to uncertainty in the supply chain caused by platforms in the US Gulf of Mexico still out of service since Hurricane Katrina. If anyone is to blame for high gasoline prices, it is buyers on the NYMEX and Americans who chose to use excessive amounts of gasoline driving their SUVs.
The US government should require all automobile manufacturers to begin producing vehicles with Flex-Fuel vehicles by 2008. This would 'prime' the US with vehicles capable of running on Ethanol fuel and speed up the production of Ethanol country wide so that the US economy would finally be in a position to decrease oil imports and move to a more self sufficient fuel base for many of its cars and trucks.
5/31/06 ( 480 )
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