Oil: Discuss

[Beav]

Marathon asks judge to move Ky. lawsuit
Federal court may hear claims of price gouging
By David Goetz
dgoetz@courier-journal.com
The Courier-Journal



Marathon Oil Co. has asked a federal judge to move a lawsuit accusing it of gasoline price gouging from a Kentucky court to federal court, where Marathon is challenging the constitutionality of the state's pricing law.

Attorney General Greg Stumbo sued Marathon last week in Franklin Circuit Court in Frankfort, accusing the company and its Speedway SuperAmerica subsidiary of overcharging Kentucky motorists $89 million in 2005 in the two months after hurricanes Katrina and Rita damaged oil operations on the Gulf Coast.



If U.S. District Judge Karen Caldwell agrees to the change, the pricing issue could be combined with Marathon's lawsuit against Stumbo and Gov. Ernie Fletcher, filed last week in federal court in Frankfort. That complaint calls the pricing law too vague and says it violates the interstate commerce protections of the U.S. Constitution.

Stumbo has asked for a jury trial in the state lawsuit; Marathon has asked Caldwell to rule directly on the issues.

Deputy Attorney General Pierce Whites called Marathon's motion "a desperate attempt to avoid a jury ruling on the evidence" and said Stumbo is "confident the judge will see it for what it is."

Marathon spokeswoman Angelia Graves said combining the two cases is a more efficient way of handling them. She declined further comment.

Marathon, based in Houston, argued that the pricing lawsuit is eligible for removal since it is between entities in different states and involves more than the $75,000 federal minimum.

Whites said Stumbo plans to ask the federal court to remand Marathon's lawsuit to Franklin Circuit Court.

In the weeks before Hurricane Katrina knocked out Gulf Coast oil platforms and refineries, gasoline prices in Louisville averaged between $2.20 and $2.60 per gallon. But within days of the storm, prices reached $3. By November 2005, prices had dipped below $2.



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The Myth Of Peak Oil

There is overwhelming evidence that 'peak oil' scenarios are fabricated to raise the cost of fossil fuels. Below is an article followed by a categorized archive of the information supporting this conclusion.

Paul Joseph Watson & Alex Jones | October 12 2005

Peak oil is a scam designed to create artificial scarcity and jack up prices while giving the state an excuse to invade our lives and order us to sacrifice our hard-earned living standards.

Publicly available CFR and Club of Rome strategy manuals from 30 years ago say that a global government needs to control the world population through neo-feudalism by creating artificial scarcity. Now that the social architects have de-industrialized the United States, they are going to blame our economic disintegration on lack of energy supplies.

Globalization is all about consolidation. Now that the world economy has become so centralized through the Globalists operations, they are going to continue to consolidate and blame it on the West's "evil" overconsumption of fossil fuels, while at the same time blocking the development and integration of renewable clean technologies.

In other words, Peak oil is a scam to create artificial scarcity and drive prices up. Meanwhile, alternative fuel technologies which have been around for decades are intentionally suppressed.

Peak oil is a theory advanced by the elite, by the oil industry, by the very people that you would think peak oil would harm, unless it was a cover for another agenda. Which from the evidence of artificial scarcity being deliberately created, the reasons for doing so and who benefits, it’s clear that peak oil is a myth and it should be exposed for what it is. Another excuse for the Globalists to seize more control over our lives and sacrifice more American sovereignty in the meantime.

The lies of artificial scarcity

The crux of the issue is that if oil was plentiful in areas in which we are being told by the government and the oil companies that it is not, then we have clear evidence that artificial scarcity is being simulated in order to drive forward a myriad of other agendas. And we have concrete examples of where this has happened.

Three separate internal confidential memos from Mobil, Chevron and Texaco have been obtained by The Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights.

These memos outline a deliberate agenda to gouge prices and create artificial scarcity by limiting capacities of and outright closing oil refineries. This was a nationwide lobbying effort led by the American Petroleum Institute to encourage refineries to do this.

An internal Chevron memo states; "A senior energy analyst at the recent API convention warned that if the US petroleum industry doesn't reduce its refining capacity it will never see any substantial increase in refinery margins."

The Memos make clear that blockages in refining capacity and opening new refineries did not come from environmental organizations, as the oil industry claimed, but via a deliberate policy of limitation and price gouging at the behest of the oil industry itself.

The mystery of Eugene Island 330 and self-renewing oil supplies

Eugene Island is an oil field in the gulf of Mexico, 80 miles off the coast of Louisiana. It was discovered in 1973 and began producing 15,000 barrels of oil a day which then slowed to about 4,000 barrels in 1989.

But then for no logical reason whatsoever, production spiked back up to 13,000 barrels a day.

What the researchers found when they analyzed the oil field with time lapse 3-D seismic imaging is that there was an unexplained deep fault in the bottom corner of the computer scan, which showed oil gushing in from a previously unknown deep source and migrating up through the rock to replenish the existing supply.

Furthermore, the analysis of the oil now being produced at Eugene Island shows that its age is geologically different from the oil produced there after the refinery first opened. Suggesting strongly that it is now emerging from a different, unexplained source.

The last estimates of probable reserves shot up from 60 million barrels to 400 million barrels.

Both the scientists and geologists from the big oil companies have seen the evidence and admitted that the Eugene Island oil field is refilling itself.

This completely contradicts peak oil theory and with technology improving at an accelerating pace it seems obvious that there are more Eugene Islands out there waiting to be discovered. So the scientific community needs to embrace these possibilities and lobby for funding into finding more of these deep source replenishing oilfields.

The existence of self-renewing oil fields shatters the peak oil myth. If oil is a naturally replenishing inorganic substance then how can it possibly run out?

The future of oil

This year in particular we have seen a strong hike in oil prices and are being told to simply get used to it because this is the way it is going to be. In the wake of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita gas prices have shot up amid claims of vast energy shortages. Americans are being asked to turn off lights, change thermostat settings, drive slower, insulate homes and take other steps. Meanwhile the oil companies continue to make record profits.

Flying in the face of the so called peak oil crisis are the facts. If we are running out of oil so quickly then why are reserves being continually increased and production skyrocketing?

In the 1980s OPEC decided to switch to a quota production system based on the size of reserves. The larger the reserves a country said it had the more it could pump.

Earlier this year Saudi Arabia reportedly increased its crude reserves by around 200 billion barrels. Saudi oil Is secure and plentiful, say officials.

“These huge reserves enable the Kingdom to remain a major oil producer for between 70 and 100 years, even if it raises its production capacity to 15 million barrels per day, which may well happen during the next 15 years,”

Is this the normal course of behavior if we are currently at the peak for oil production? The answer is no, it's the normal course of action for increasing production.

There have also been reports that Russia has vastly increased its reserves even beyond those of Saudi Arabia. Why would they do this if they believed there would be no more oil to get hold of? It seems clear that Russia is ready for unlimited future production of oil.

There is a clear contradiction between the peak oil theory and the continual increase in oil reserves and production.

New untapped oil sources are being discovered everywhere on earth. The notion that there are somehow only a few sources that the West is trying to monopolize is a complete myth, promulgated by those raking in the massive profits. After all how do you make huge profits from something available in abundance?

A Wall Street Journal article by Peter Huber and Mark Mills describes how the price of oil remains high because the cost of oil remains so low. We are not dependent on the middle east for oil because the world's supplies are diminishing, it is because it is more profitable to tap middle east supplies. Thus the myth of peak oil is needed in order to silence the call for tapping the planet's other plentiful reserves.

Richard Branson has even stated his intention to set up his own refinery because the price of oil is artificially being kept high whilst new sources are not being explored and new refineries not being built.

"Opec is effectively an illegal cartel that can meet happily, nobody takes them to court," Branson has said. "They collude to keep prices high."

So if more refineries were built and different resources tapped, the oil prices would come down and the illegal cartel OPEC would see profits diminish. It is no wonder then that the argument for peak oil is so appealing to OPEC. If no one invests to build refineries because they don't believe there is enough oil, then who benefits? OPEC and the oil elites of course.

It seems that every time there is some kind of energy crisis, OPEC INCREASES production. The remarkable thing about this is that they always state that they are doing it to ease prices, yet prices always shoot up because they promulgate the myth that they are putting some of their last reserves into the market. Analysts seem confused and always state that they don't believe upping production will cut prices.

In a recent report the International Monetary Fund projected that global demand for oil by 2030 would reach 139 million barrels a day, a 65 percent increase.

"We should expect to live with high and volatile oil prices," said Raghuram Rajan, the IMF's chief economist. "In short, it's going to be a rocky road going forward."

Yet independent analysts and even some within OPEC seem to believe that the demand for oil is diminishing. Why the contradiction?

The peak oil and demand myth is peddled by the establishment-run fake left activist groups, OPEC and globalist arms such as the IMF.

Rolling Stone magazine even carried an article in its April issue heavily biased towards making people believe the peak oil lie.

The Scientific evidence also flies in the face of the peak oil theory. Scientific research dating back over a hundred years, more recently updated in a Scientific Paper Published In 'Energia' suggests that oil is abiotic, not the product of long decayed biological matter. Oil, for better or for worse, is not a non-renewable resource. It, like coal, and natural gas, replenishes from sources within the mantle of earth.

No coincidence then that the Russians, who pioneered this research have pumped expenditure into deep underground oil excavation.

We have previously scientifically exposed the scam behind peak oil. Here is a 1 hour+ audio clip featuring Alex Jones' comments on peak oil and then the analysis of respected scientific commentator Dr. Nick Begich who presents evidence to suggest the idea of Peak oil is artificial.

A dangerous fallout precedent being set is that people on both the left and right believe wars are being fought in order to tap the last reserves of oil on the planet. The "coalition of the willing", whoever they may be for any given war, will not pay particular attention to refuting this claim because it allows them a reason to start and continue said war.

Even though many will see it as immoral, many will subconsciously attach it as a reason for the war. In reality the war is purely for profit, power and control, oil can be a part of that, but only if the peak oil claim is upheld.

If we continue to let the corrupt elite tell us we are wholly dependent on oil, we may reach a twisted situation whereby they can justify starvation and mass global poverty, perhaps even depopulation, even within the western world due to the fact that our energy supplies are finished.

Peak oil is just another weapon the globalists have in their arsenal to move towards a new world order where the elite get richer and everyone else falls into line.

[dcarrb]

I'd like to see gasoline considered a utility rather than a commodity, with prices regulated accordingly. Here in Georgia, if electric or natural gas providers wish to increase rates, they must appear before the Public Service Commission and show cause. Or at least, they have to go through the motions...

dcb

[Crazy_pilot]

A Canadian firm ran a study and determined that taking into account production cost and traditional profit margins, Canadians are being overcharged between .15 and .27/litre. This is the equivalent of overpaying .50 to .90 per gallon in the States.

If all the math adds up I wouldn't complain, but with the oil companies bringing in record profits I get a little ticked.

[Beav]

Don't forget those record profits are posted AFTER the brass gets their bloated paychecks.

[immortal_suby]

Originally Posted by Beav

Don't forget those record profits are posted AFTER the brass gets their bloated paychecks.

those bastards! (shakes fist)

I didn't buy any gas today.

[NikFu S.]

I now believe peak oil to be a myth.

[dcarrb]

Whether or not one believes there's enough petroleum (including oil shale, coal tar, whatever) to last another 10 years or 100, there's one pure truth: It's a finite resource, and when there's only so much of something to go around (as the dollars in my wallet), it's good practice to conserve.

Trouble is, for the past 50 years we've been encouraged to burn the stuff like there's no tomorrow. When I was a kid my father walked to work, and I walked to school, and Mom took the trolley to town to shop; this was a typical American middle-class suburban existence on an auto worker's paycheck in the late 50s and early 60s. When Dad went to work for Delta (across the airport runways from the Ford plant) he bought a used, 4-door, '61 Falcon with a smallish straight six and three on the tree; a car that probably went farther on a gallon of gas than anything of comparable size today. Of course, it had no AC and no power-anything, and rubber matting instead of carpeting. Compare this to our automotive expectations today.

Of my 8 co-workers, I'm the second closest to the shop, at <12 miles. Only one lives in town; some drive 20, 30 miles, one way. Yep, cheap gas. We don't have to go back to the way things were, but we do need to understand how things have changed, and why, and ponder whether or not these changes have been for the better.

Then again, maybe we should quit carping about fuel cost and instead buy Exxon stock.

dcb

[thumper_svx]

If I had time to type it, all this would lead me to a discussion of why I think suburban planning is completely bass-ackward and fundamentally flawed. The suburbs as they are currently designed have changed our expectations of what a city should look like, and put almost all of the employees of corporations at least 10 miles or more from the place where they work. This sprawl has made it untenable to build and operate a public transport structure because costs of maintaining it become unrealistic.

For all the warts, many European cities have the right idea. In many of them, residential areas aren't as segmented from the commercial districts as they are in the US, and public transport is simple, cheap and almost ubiquitous. In many large European cities, like London (where I used to live) it is impossible to travel without using public transportation unless you walk; most cars are banned from Central London without paying special fees.

I'm not saying this is what should be done in the US; we've had 50-60 years of urban and suburban planning that focuses on how to lay out a city with the presumption that cars are a part of the picture. It would take at least another 50-60 years of focusing on redesigning and rebuilding cities to turn this country into one that can effectively implement public transport. Unfortunately, until the oil actually runs out Americans generally don't want to believe it... and by the time that happens it'll be too late to fix the problem. The transition will be painful.

BTW, I don't believe peak oil either... but I do agree that it's a finite resource (as is all energy at the end of the day). We as a society need to find better storage mechanisms and better ways to harness that energy, and soon. We like to convince ourselves that oil won't run out but the simple fact is that the way we consume it, there's almost a guarantee that it'll expire sooner or later.

Take with a grain of salt from a guy who drives a 3600lb AWD car that gets 23mpg...

[dcarrb]

Originally Posted by thumper_svx

Take with a grain of salt from a guy who drives a 3600lb AWD car that gets 23mpg...

Twenty three? Got me beat by about 1.5 MPG.

True, my ride's not so green, nor as thrifty on fuel as I'd like. Much as I hate to say it, my current personal economic reality is this: I can buy lots of gas with that car payment I'm not making.

True American that I am, I think everybody should conserve... 'cept me.

dcb

[lhopp77]

Originally Posted by Beav

Don't forget those record profits are posted AFTER the brass gets their bloated paychecks.

It is a very fuzzy and controversial issue, but I just point out one thing---oil company profit margins are in the 8-9%range while healthcare company profits are in the 19-20% range.

RECORD oil company profits are measured in total dollars and NOT percent of overall. Shear volume of sales is driving the record profits.

AND--environmentalists would want you to believe you are being ripped off because of big business, not because of the domestic restrictions placed on drilling, exploration refinery construction, etc. Also, remember we would be less dependent upon oil if the environmentalists had not essentially stopped nuclear power plant construction.

We do have huge untapped reserves that are not being used---but not because of the big oil strategies.

If you are close to oil production (even individual wells) you know that each well has a maximum pumping capacity. A single well resources may only permit it to be pumped only a few hours a month due to capacity. The oil company does have the latitude to pump less than capacity to a point. So, of course during times of high prices----wells are pumped at maximum capacity. This in turn generates more market oil, so of course drives the price of gasoline down. DAMN---it seems the oil companies have a market decision to make---make maximum profit from oil or from gasoline??????????

BOTTOM line to me---GET THE ENVIRONMENTALISTS UNDER CONTROL and then let the free market take over. If you want to restrict the free market--maybe you live in the wrong country.

As a side light--I would not object to government restricting the salaries and management perk costs of PUBLICALLY held companies. At the same time you should limit political terms for many of the same runaway cost concerns.

Lee (off my soap box for now)

[lhopp77]

Originally Posted by thumper_svx

If I had time to type it, all this would lead me to a discussion of why I think suburban planning is completely bass-ackward and fundamentally flawed. The suburbs as they are currently designed have changed our expectations of what a city should look like, and put almost all of the employees of corporations at least 10 miles or more from the place where they work. This sprawl has made it untenable to build and operate a public transport structure because costs of maintaining it become unrealistic.

For all the warts, many European cities have the right idea. In many of them, residential areas aren't as segmented from the commercial districts as they are in the US, and public transport is simple, cheap and almost ubiquitous. In many large European cities, like London (where I used to live) it is impossible to travel without using public transportation unless you walk; most cars are banned from Central London without paying special fees.

I'm not saying this is what should be done in the US; we've had 50-60 years of urban and suburban planning that focuses on how to lay out a city with the presumption that cars are a part of the picture. It would take at least another 50-60 years of focusing on redesigning and rebuilding cities to turn this country into one that can effectively implement public transport. Unfortunately, until the oil actually runs out Americans generally don't want to believe it... and by the time that happens it'll be too late to fix the problem. The transition will be painful.

You seem to overlook HOW we got like we are--It has been by choice starting at the founding of this country. The European cities essentially have very little choice based on land mass and population. Remember that the entire UK is only about the size of the state of Oregon.

Likewise you appear to blame our problems on "urban planning" when in fact it is INDIVIDUAL CHOICE that drives the planning. Most people do not want to live in the inner cities. Housing is built where it will sell at the best prices--very simple.

Look at most of the "new world" developed countries. They are also spread out like we are because "choice" permits it and is not restricted by ancient construction, space restrictions and large population densities.

Lee

[dcarrb]

Originally Posted by lhopp77

BOTTOM line to me---GET THE ENVIRONMENTALISTS UNDER CONTROL and then let the free market take over. If you want to restrict the free market--maybe you live in the wrong country.

Ah, comrade, surely if "the environmentalists" possessed this power you ascribe to them, we'd be wearing coveralls made of organically-grown hemp and riding bicycles (made of 100% post-consumer recycled materials, of course) to our jobs on collective farms, while the oil barons and other champions of the lost free market cause labor in re-education camps located in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

dcb

[thumper_svx]

Originally Posted by lhopp77

You seem to overlook HOW we got like we are--It has been by choice starting at the founding of this country. The European cities essentially have very little choice based on land mass and population. Remember that the entire UK is only about the size of the state of Oregon.

Likewise you appear to blame our problems on "urban planning" when in fact it is INDIVIDUAL CHOICE that drives the planning. Most people do not want to live in the inner cities. Housing is built where it will sell at the best prices--very simple.

Look at most of the "new world" developed countries. They are also spread out like we are because "choice" permits it and is not restricted by ancient construction, space restrictions and large population densities.

Lee

Oh, I don't disagree with a thing you said. The simple fact is you're right; the urban planning was by choice. However, choice rarely fits realities unless the entire picture is understood. Realize that when this choice was made, few people were talking about oil being a limited resource. This choice was made without the appropriate information being available; that the oil was scarce.

Now, the problem is that there are too many people who want to stick their fingers in their ears and say "la-la-la-la" when someone tries to tell them that things need to change. There are a few half-hearted attempts to redesign communities based around walking distance instead of driving distance; hell, there's a good example of that near where I live (New Town St. Charles FYI) that has been designed around human beings, not cars. However, these communities are typically quite pricey... ironically the people most likely to buy these houses are also the most likely to own cars!

However, the problem is that the real issue is being clouded. The reality is that whether or not you believe oil is a renewable resource or not, the simple fact is that we're consuming it at a far greater rate than it can renew. That means sooner or later we ARE going to run out of it... or at least have to curb our consumption to probably less than one tenth of our current consumption. Cars are a small part of the problem; the problem is the abject terror that most civilians and government seem to use to react to alternatives like nuclear (OH NO!!! Chernobyl!!! Three Mile Island!!!!) or wind (OH NO!!! What about the birds? Our lovely view? The eyesore!). Those who want to push the oil industry are the worst at downplaying alternatives, and the ones who scream loudest and therefore cloud and muddy the issue.

Unless we find a better way, this country is going to hurt a lot before it can heal. Sure, there are alternatives; but few of them would be acceptable to the American public as it currently stands simply because it's "... not the way we've always done it."

Now, don't misunderstand me; I'm not saying that the Europeans are right (I am one, by the way ) but the model of ubiquitous public transport and more compact cities are something we are going to have to take some example from. If we don't, then we run the risk of "marooning" ourselves in a situation where the costs to get to and from work exceed the income from actually going there. This is inevitable in my opinion. Look at the challenges cities in this country face; look at the challenges New York faces with oil consumption. It's ridiculous; you own a car in Manhattan and you'll drive it once a week, and get single-digit mpg because you're sitting in a traffic jam. It's quicker to walk just about anywhere in Manhattan or get the subway. Even taxis are almost worthless in some areas.

Sorry... I didn't mean to get off on a rant... just reply to you, Lee

[NikFu S.]

There is only one solution.


Monorail!

It can have mini wind generators on it's roof to power your ipods and laptops.


The hard part will be getting everyone to pedal quickly.

Wewsh.

[thumper_svx]

LOL!!! Brilliant, dude!

Actually, believe it or not I put some solar cells on a friend's roof out in the country a couple of years ago. During the winter (it's normally still sunny during the winter around here, just cold!) his electric bill is like $12 a month because the majority of the power for his entire home is actually generated by the cells. Even during the height of summer with the A/C going he won't pay more than $100 in a single month because the sun's that much stronger... his house is the same as mine, same age as mine and my bill can easily top $200 in a month during July and August.