‘Big Oil is ripping off Californians’

The governor calls an extraordinary session to define fines for speculators with the price of gasoline

Governor Gavin Newsom called for a special session of the legislature to establish fines for gasoline distribution corporations that increase consumer prices.

“Big Oil is ripping off Californians,” the governor declared. Corporations have reported profits like never before of more than $41.4 billion combined.

This Thursday was the first day in eight months that the average price of regular gasoline in California settled below $5 a gallon, at $4.90, but it is the most expensive gasoline in the United States and is at least $1.43 more. expensive than the national average, according to the Association of American Motorists (AAA).

“Don’t tell me,” Mrs. Guadalupe Verduzco told La Opinión, “I just took my children to school, I take the opportunity to go on an errand and do any other lap I have to do so that it is in the same route, but I I feel like I’ve gone on a hike; I think I spend about $10 a day on gas.”

The governor said he called a special session “to increase price transparency and protect Californians from outrageous price increases in the future” for fuel.

The California Energy Commission convened a meeting this week with corporate representatives, expert analysts and non-government groups to find out why consumer gasoline prices soared, but no company representatives came to the meeting, the California Energy Commission reported. Commissioner Patty Monahan.

“The lack of involvement from refiners, participation in the discussion, really limits our ability to understand more deeply why Californians paid $2.61 more than other Americans,” the commissioner said.

Governor Newsom explained that it is a “deafening silence from the industry” so “a price gouging penalty is needed to hold them accountable for speculating at the expense of California families.”

Although the industry has claimed that the Russian invasion of the Ukraine caused a shortage of crude oil and that the shortage led to the increase in prices, an expert from the University of California at Berkeley, the director of the Haas Energy Institute at UC Berkeley, Severin Borenstein He says the circumstances are different.

“This is not a crude oil cost issue; it is not a problem of import restrictions; nor is it a problem of refinery supply restrictions. Nor is it a problem of market isolation,” Borenstein said. “They are bringing water to their mill.”

Governor Newsom made the calculations that this is too much water for the mill of the oil industry.

The PBF Energy Corporation reported profits 1,700 percent higher than last year; Phillips 66 of 1,243 percent higher than last year; Marathon 545 and Valero 500 percent larger than last year; Exxon earned more than $19.7 billion, Chevron $11.2 billion and Shell $9.45 billion.

Although the high price of fuel is influenced by the fact that the state establishes an additional tax to compensate the environment, this increase is insufficient for the rise in prices that has been seen this year.

The state Energy Commission lacks the authority to investigate the companies and determine the precise reason for the high costs to consumers.

However Jamie Court, the executive director of Consumer Watchdog, explained that the price rises in the process of refining oil into gasoline and blending with additives for cold months and warm months.

Generally speaking, refineries in the state of California as a whole produce an amount that is equal to what is used by consumers, so if a refinery stops producing, it creates a deficit and leads to higher prices.

The state has watched that process, and California’s attorney general has already warned the corporations, which own the refineries, that they may face penalties and urged potential witnesses to come forward.

“I want to warn refiners not to take advantage of market disruption. My office is currently litigating multinational companies SK Energy Americas and Vitol for anti-competitive conduct, and we are closely monitoring the market and will not hesitate to take action against others if they break the law,” prosecutor Rob Bonta said in March.

Now in the meeting next Monday, the legislature will decide the type of sanctions that California can apply to speculators with the refineries and the price of fuel.