Reply #2: If we drilled in more places like ANWLR where would that oil go? [View All]

[Mountainman]

I have always wondered what the route is for oil from the well to the gas pump. My guess is that it is taken from the ground and stored somewhere. Then it is sold to the highest bidder or who ever holds the futures contract on it. That could be anyone anywhere in the world. It is more than likely sold and resold before it ever gets to a refinery. And that refinery could be anywhere in the world.

The right is always saying we need to drill for more oil in the U.S. and build more refineries but that will not bring about lower gas prices. It will just create more inventories for speculators to profit from by buying more futures contracts.

The price of gas is connected to the amount of profits made by the middlemen. The more it is traded the more middlemen make profits and the higher the cost is thus the higher the gasoline prices.

I may be close to being right. But I know high gas prices have nothing to do with environmentalists preventing drilling and building refineries.

We have oil wells off the cost of Santa Barbara and a refinery at Goviota just down the coast a few miles and gas prices are over $4.00 a gallon. Also last year Shell closed down a refinery in Bakersfield just as the MSM was telling us environmentalist are preventing more gasoline production by making it hard to build new refineries.


During the gasoline shortages in the 70's my ex-wife's cousin was and engineer for the Chesy System in Lima Ohio. Standard oil had a giant refinery there. He told us that he was on loan full time to the refinery moving tank cars full of refined gas into rail yards for storage all the while people could not buy gas!