Just how bad is it getting in California? We have hit the $3 mark in the Seattle area. And since it is usual for gas to be about $1 more in the Big
Valley and San Diego I'm stressing BIG TIME! At $3 with my normal 4000 mile trip it will cost me $1200 just in gas for my normal Baja fix this summer
Debra - 5-1-2006 at 09:59 AM
Come on guys......I see you reading, could you PLEASE take a minute to say where you are and what you are paying for gas? Thankselgatoloco - 5-1-2006 at 10:07 AM
I use diesel.
Debra
Baja Bernie - 5-1-2006 at 10:09 AM
San Diego $3.19 at CostcoDebra - 5-1-2006 at 10:09 AM
Good thing you are close to the border, so you commute to buy diesel in Baja?Debra - 5-1-2006 at 10:11 AM
Thanks Bernie, that isn't as bad as I feared.elgatoloco - 5-1-2006 at 10:17 AM
Quote:
Originally posted by Debra
Good thing you are close to the border, so you commute to buy diesel in Baja?
We NEVER miss an oppurtunity to head down for breakfast in TJ or lunch at Dave's or dinner at one of our many favorite restaurants or a quick surf or
to stock up on tequila or get beach rocks for our yard at home. We always make sure that our tank is as empty as possible and we ALWAYS end up
spending the $40-50-60 dollars we save while we are down there.
The $40, 50, or 60 is much better spent on food, rocks and Tequilla and fun. Thanks for the links!Fatboy - 5-1-2006 at 12:03 PM
In Redding gas is $3.15 to $3.25 today. You could find under $3.10 if you looked but it isn't worth it to drive any further to save what amounts to 2%
or 3% when you can waste that much in fuel driving an extra 5 or 10 miles around town.Debra - 5-1-2006 at 12:49 PM
Thanks everyone.....
From the emails I have gotten, (and the links provided by "elgatoloco") the good news seems to be that it's not much worse than Seattle, the bad news
is that Seattle has caught up with the GAS PRICES FROM HELL! (that would be California) DianaT - 5-1-2006 at 01:15 PM
Gas here south of San Diego went up again today. Paid $3.29---cheapest we could find.
DianeDavid K - 5-1-2006 at 02:46 PM
May 1 in Oceanside, the cheapest I saw was $3.199 at Arco and a 76 station on Mission Ave. about 3 lights east of I-5.
In San Marcos/Escondido today the Arco at Nordahl and Hwy. 78 was $3.159
The other stations ranged from $3.25 to $3.46 for regular.Ken Cooke - 5-1-2006 at 09:27 PM
Riverside, CA (not far from Fwy 91 and I-15) Gas Prices for 87 octane are $3.23/gallon.
Yuma AZ yesterday 5/1
2.99 for regular, 3.01 for dieselSkeet/Loreto - 5-3-2006 at 02:22 AM
Debra: Here in the Great State of Texas-The Panhandle of Texas where some areas ae covered with producing Oil Wells, the price of diesel was $2.78 -
Price of Gas $2.68.
After 2007 it will not make much difference as I have heard that all diesels in the U>S will have to meet California Standards_ Means they will be
loaded with all the Controls for emmisons- Poor Performance-costly- Less Horse Power.
Makes a Toyoto sound like a good Buy!!
Good Luck
Skeet/Loreto
"In God I Trust"White Angel - 5-3-2006 at 06:17 AM
Still under $3 north of Boston; but getting there! $2.93 pretty much the norm for regular.wornout - 5-3-2006 at 08:02 AM
San Felipe, Baja, Mexico, I believe it is somewhere around $2.39 a gallon, depending on today's exchange rate. Headed to town today, will re-check.
[Edited on 5-3-2006 by wornout]meme - 5-3-2006 at 08:55 AM
My son reported today a station near his home in Mission Viego, Ca. was $3.59 a gal. this a.m.daveB - 5-3-2006 at 09:23 AM
Debra, just a bit north of you we have 1.14 CAD per litre, works out to about 3.88 USD per US gallon. This is actually getting better due to the rise
in the CAD, currently trading at over 90 cents to your dollar - an increase from the 62 cent level of January, 2002.Dianamo - 5-3-2006 at 12:10 PM
Near my house in Silicon Valley on May 4 regular is about $3.29 per gallon.
Don't even try to plan your budget more than a few days ahead of departure.
I am seeing gas prices around Modesto/Oakdale get raised twice a day.
Cheapest here today is $3.09 and highest is about $3.49, but stick around, that was at noon.
Interesting.... last week I was back East for meetings.
I left my brother-in-law's place in Westchester, NY and it was about $3.35, drove 45 minutes to Jersey and it was $2.79. That is as bad as the
Southern Border situation.Bajaboy - 5-3-2006 at 04:10 PM
What are your options at this point? If you need/want Baja, you're going to pay the price. Cut back somewhere else....
ZacDavid K - 5-3-2006 at 07:53 PM
Just reach the border with enough gas to get 20 kms. south, where the price is the standard national rate... about $2.20/ gallon (Magna/Regular).comitan - 5-17-2006 at 07:27 AM
Interesting article:
Return to regular view
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Big Oil limiting gasoline supply
California pays for corporate chicanery
- Jamie Court
Sunday, May 14, 2006
Californians are paying the highest price in the continental United States for gasoline. The nation's big oil companies announced world record profits
for the first quarter, building on last year's world record profits. Sound familiar?
The latest version of California's electricity crisis registered $3.37 per gallon at the pump last week.
A few years ago, Enron and other energy companies turned off the lights and robbed Californians blind. They did it by closing power plants and
artificially withholding electricity to give the illusion of scarcity. That made the price of electricity soar, even though the price of producing it
was minimal.
Big Oil is playing a similar game now. A few large oil companies are making billions of dollars by artificially limiting refined gasoline supplies to
jack up prices far in excess of raw material and production costs. (That's why a recent drop in crude oil prices isn't resulting in reductions at the
pump.)
California oil refiners have rigged their system by limiting the number of refineries and running on low inventories. The companies have closed nearly
half the state's refineries since federal gasoline deregulation in 1981. Today, the gasoline supply barely meets demand. As a result, the commodity
appears scarce and the market price for it is sky high, along with profits.
The latest proof comes from government gasoline pricing reports. They show that from January to April, crude oil costs increased far less than the
run-up in gasoline prices, even assuming that refiners all had to pay the high "spot market price" for crude oil, which they didn't.
The increases in the crude oil "spot price" accounted for only 12 cents extra per gallon of the 60-cent rise in that period. More than 40 cents of the
60-cent increase in gasoline prices over 3 1/2 months came as increased refinery profit margins for the oil companies.
The reason oil companies generally do not pay the spot price for crude is that they either harvest crude oil from their own fields or have long-term
contracts at cheaper prices. So even the oil spot price calculation gives oil companies too much credit for increased costs of producing gasoline.
The refiners also blame increased costs for ethanol additives for the big jump at the pump. But if ethanol blending increased costs for oil companies
in California, other states in the West using conventional unblended gasoline should not be as affected. Yet Washington state, which uses only
conventional gasoline and has similar refinery capacity and crude oil sources, saw increases at a higher percentage rate than California's. To pump up
their profits, refiners have also taken a page out of Enron's playbook by shipping needed energy products out of the state.
According to a California Energy Commission report, state refiners recently switched production from our state's gasoline formula to gasoline that
could be used only in other states, including Arizona, Nevada and Oregon. The supply of export gasoline increased by a startling 38.5 percent during a
single week, while production for in-state use fell by more than 10 percent. This prevented any surplus in California, which would have pushed prices
downward.
The most visible proof of refiner profiteering came in corporate reports to shareholders. Chevron, for example, informed its investors of a 49 percent
increase in net income financed by a 260 percent increase in refining and marketing profits, in large part coming from California.
When oil companies can make more money by making less gasoline, what is their incentive to change?
Only the big stick of government regulation of the gasoline supply can help.
First, the state Public Utilities Commission should be charged with regulating gasoline supplies. The commission could require refiners to meet demand
by controlling exports of gasoline products and by monitoring refinery shutdowns to prevent manipulation of supplies. If necessary, the commission
could force oil companies to build new refining capacity.
Second, California needs to invest in alternative fuels to stop our dependence on petroleum and the companies that control it. Signatures are expected
to be turned in soon for a November ballot measure to take back a small portion of oil companies' windfall profits in order to fund the development of
alternative fuels that could significantly reduce gasoline consumption and fuel prices.
Unfortunately, Big Oil, like Enron, has paid a lot of campaign cash for its political cover. For example, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has received $2.2
million in campaign contributions from oil companies, running a close second to President Bush ($2.6 million) for top spot in most campaign
contributions in America from Big Oil.
If California politicians had acted quickly to take over power plants and stop the electricity rip-off, Californians would have saved tens of billions
of dollars. State officials need to learn from that lesson or the financial toll from this "energy crisis" -- and the next -- will be just as bad.
Jamie Court is president of Santa Monica's Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights. Contact us at insight@sfchronicle.com.
