ORIGINAL: purnrg
Don't forget that gas pricing is based on refining capacity not raw crude volume, and there have been no new refineries built in 10 years, so the best way to keep prices high is to reduce capacity therfore increasing demand for less capacity, most of the gas we use is refined in Louisiana and Texas and is trucked to the rest of the Continent.
In Canada the Provincial government of Newfoundland is petitioning the federal government to allow the Provincial government of Newfoundland the right to cancel oil recource licences (drilling and pumping) if the oil company holding the licence does not exploit the reserve within 20 years. What this means is if the oil company has found oil and does not get it out of the ground in 20 years they lose their claim on the reserve.
This is happening all over the world, there are plenty of oil resources but in order to keep prices high they are not being exploited.
Most of the oil we use in north america comes from north america itself, not the middle east as some people believe.
Actually, I believe it has been close to 30 years since a new refinery was built. There are plenty of places where we could drill in the states. There is supposed to be oil in Colorado and someother states in that area. We need more refineries and we need to start doing more drilling. Uncle Sam needs to get out of the way of doing this because these prices are redicilous. Ethanol is too much a long term solution for now and it isn't that cost effective. It cost more to operate a FFV vehicle on E85 than it does to run regular gasoline. 10% blends work beautifully, that is always what I use, but we need to improve oil production.
BOOSS, I hope your joking. If we wanted Iraq's oil, all we had to do was lift the sanctions on them.