Without national speed limit, Driving and Fuel usage down over last year in the US

[vwW12]

Originally Posted by Duckhunter

I just wonder if the oil will stay here and be refined for our use or will it just go on the open market.

Uhhh... oil is a commodity, i.e., economically speaking, it does not really matter where it goes or comes, so long as the free market gets it to where you need it at the lowest possible cost.

I live in Florida. Everything else being equal, I'd rather get my Alaska or California oil cheap and imported from Mexico than have a supertanker go from Alaska to Patagonia, round Cape Horn, and all the way back up to North America, just to make some people "feel" good.

For instance, it could be that economically speaking the best thing to do with California and Alaska sea oil is to send it all to Japan and some U.S. company will receive billions of Yen in exchange. So what? That California sea oil will have paid for thousands of California jobs, billions in royalties to the U.S., and billions of U.S. taxes.

The U.S. company can then convert the Yen into Mexican pesos and buy billions of dollars worth of Gulf Mexican oil so that Floridians can fuel our smart cars efficiently and cheaply.

Mexico is the third largest supplier of oil to these United States. Today, we send $500 billion/year to Mexico to purchase oil from it. If Congress lifts the current prohibition on drilling for oil in the California coast, we might keep sending $500 billion to Mexico, but these might be offset with sales of California sea oil to Japan.

Right now, there is no offset, because of the drilling prohibition. It is a net loss to our country, year after year after year.

[2smartArizona]

Originally Posted by xcrew229x

2smartArizona...... I very much appreciate your pics. And really like seeing a thoroughly dirty BMW that is fullfilling it's purpose. Good job

I'm just very fortunate in that I only work 8 months and three weeks out of the year and I am well compensated for the time I do work. I have been very lucky in life, and that allows me to do things that others don't. I also consider it my responsiblity on this planet to kill as many bugs as I can, and get as much dirt in the air as possible with my free time. I try and drive 40,000 miles a year overall, with at least half of that on the motorbikes. The BMW R1200GS gets better than 50 mpg for me, so I don't mind the price of fuel yet.

Killing the bugs....


Before they kill me.....




DIRT....Prudhoe Bay dirt...

[BobDiaz]

Originally Posted by Duckhunter

I just wonder if the oil will stay here and be refined for our use or will it just go on the open market. If it goes on the open market it will just be a drop in the bucket and hardly at all affect prices.

It's not about prices, the key would be to have the laws allowing the President the power to declare a Nation Energy Emergency for say 60 days. Say war breaks out in the Middle East and the supply of oil is cut off, IF the President declares an emergency, no USA oil may be shipped out side the country. Before the 60 days would be up Congress would vote to continue the Emergency or not.

Such a system would protect us from a sudden cut-off in the supply of oil. We've seen when a jump from $3 to $4+/gallon for gas causes a major impact in our economy. What will happen if there's a major drop in the supply and gas jumps to $8+ per gallon?



Bob Diaz