Democrats and gas prices
- Thread starter Diogenes
- Start date
"As to separation between California prices and the prices in the rest of the United States, we can offer the following information. For Valero, California is the most expensive operating environment in the country and a very hostile regulatory environment for refining. California policy makers have knowingly adopted policies with the expressed intent of eliminating the refinery sector.
California requires refiners to pay very high carbon cap and trade fees and burdened gasoline with cost of the low carbon fuel standards.
With the backdrop of these policies, not surprisingly, California has seen refineries completely close or shut down major units. When you shut down refinery operations, you limit the resilience of the supply chain.From the perspective of a refiner and fuel supplier, California is the most challenging market to serve in the United States for several additional reasons. California regulators have mandated a unique blend of gasoline that is not readily available outside of the West Coast. California is largely isolated from fuel markets of the central and eastern United States. California has imposed some of the most aggressive, and thus expensive and limiting, environmental regulatory requirements in the world. California policies have made it difficult to increase refining capacity and have prevented supply projects to lower operating costs of refineries.
We believe the Commission experts understand that California cannot mandate a unique fuel that is not readily unavailable outside of the West Coast and then burden or eliminate California refining capacity and expect to have robust fuel supplies. Adding further costs, in the form of new taxes or regulatory constraints, will only further strain the fuel market and adversely impact refiners and ultimately those costs will pass to California consumers."
If you rely on California-refined pipeline gas, here's a wake-up call.