North American Fuel Shortage Reports

[basil_hayden]

From looking at the weekly petroleum status reports this has to be a distribution problem and not an overall supply problem. ... Those supplies are not equally distributed throughout the country so if an unusual storm happens somewhere where the distribution network is sitting on low supply versus some other place in the US where weather is normal and the supply level is high then you have a problem. The weekly petroleum numbers seem to be saying there isn't a historically high demand for gasoline and supplies are more than enough overall.

Correct, it's an electricity problem. No electricity, no gas stations, no gas. Should be fixed in a week.

[pup55]

I have not said it for a long time, but it is one of the greatest technological developments in history, and a modern miracle that we can deliver 9 million barrels of highly flammable liquid within 2 miles of home for 90 percent of the American public, with 99.99 percent reliability.

It is really rare, and almost always weather driven that we see this kind of stuff happen.

The alternate fuel people are learning that to design a system like this from the ground up is practically impossible. The sunk costs/system costs/costs of setting up an entirely new distribution network, particularly at the cost we are talking about with the system the way it is, is too risky and expensive to be financed at the current risk tolerance that now exists, and is essentially outside the capability of the free enterprise system.

[Pops]

The alternate fuel people are learning that to design a system like this from the ground up is practically impossible. The sunk costs/system costs/costs of setting up an entirely new distribution network, particularly at the cost we are talking about with the system the way it is, is too risky and expensive to be financed at the current risk tolerance that now exists, and is essentially outside the capability of the free enterprise system.

Exactly, doc!

That's the problem with relying on the magic hand for a solution, it wants to be greased. If there ain't enough grease in evidence, it will just as soon work it's magic somewhere else.

Like I've always said, capitalism is great for exploiting abundant resources but shrinking resources not so much.

[Roy]

I have not seen a gas shortage in my entire lifetime of pumping gas!

Then you should consider yourself lucky. And by assuming that just because it hasn't happened to you it hasn't happened anywhere in America is a little bit narrow-minded.

I've lived through three:

1. Aftermath of Hurricane Andrew in Baton Rouge Louisiana
2. Aftermath of Kat-Rita in Baton Rouge Louisiana
3. Aftermath of Hurricane Gustav or Ike, 2008, Western NC. Ironically this was the longest lasting of the 3.

I rode my 250cc dual sport a lot during the last 2. And I have a few gas cans around and have since I joined this website. You'd be surprised how much less stress you feel when you're using 2-3 gallons a week, have 20 gallons on hand, and are not having to wait with all those other frustrated souls in the long lines, get pissed about the inevitable line cutters, see the pump run empty right when you get to it, get accosted by 'refugees', expose yourself to potential violence at the gas station etc.

The outcomes above have all been related to me by people who DID wait in the lines.

Thanks PO.com! I navigated the last two fuel shortages without a problem thanks in part to what I learned here. Certainly my 'solutions' are short term, but luckily the fuel shortages I've seen have lasted only 2-4 weeks. And in 2008 in particular, Pup55's work in the supply thread provided some warning that it was coming.

[TheAntiDoomer]

Still swimming in fuel here in the mid atlantic.