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So what’s happening? The Washington Post dug into it, noting concerns over Middle East stability, lower production by OPEC, and the continuing high price of oil — though crude prices dropped significantly yesterday.

One key factor is limited refinery capacity.

[S]ome analysts … pointed to refinery issues. Several refineries have been shut down for routine maintenance, and in the eastern United States, several refineries simply went out of business in the past year.

“Atlantic Basin capacity closures have improved refining fundamentals,” the nation’s biggest refiner, Valero, said in a slide presentation at a Credit Suisse conference this month. It estimated that refineries have closed nearly 1 million barrels a day of capacity on the East Coast or in the U.S. Virgin Islands in the past two years, which Valero said allowed it to increase profit margins.

Refinery constraints were a key factor in California’s huge gas price spike last summer. Let’s go back to the law of supply and demand. Less supply means increased demand, which means more profits. Valero’s suggestion that reducing refinery capacity increased profit margins falls squarely in line with that: Less crude oil refined into gasoline means less gasoline, which means a higher price per gallon. Granted, these refineries didn’t all close this month, but combined with other factors, the closures appear to be playing a role — and may help explain why the price of gas is going up independent of the price of crude oil.

Let that be consolation to you next time you go to fill up. It’s just basic supply and demand, manipulated by oil companies. As it always has and always will, the system works.

Philip Bump writes about the news for Gristmill. He also uses Twitter a whole lot.

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Motor vehicle deaths rose 5 percent in 2012

by greenenergy4 Posted on February 20, 2013

Motor vehicle deaths rose 5 percent in 2012

By Philip Bump

A hopefully non-fatal accident.

The National Safety Council yesterday released its estimates of 2012 motor-vehicle deaths in the United States. And: bad news. From the report [PDF]:

Motor-vehicle deaths up 5% in 2012.

Motor-vehicle deaths in 2012 totaled 36,200, up 5% from 2011 and marking the first annual increase since 2004 to 2005. The 2012 estimate is provisional and may be revised when more data are available. The total for 2012 was also up 2% from the 2010 figure. … The estimated annual population death rate is 11.49 deaths per 100,000 population, an increase of 4% from the 2011 rate. The estimated annual mileage death rate is 1.23 deaths per 100 million vehicle miles traveled, an increase of 4% from the 2011 rate. …

The estimated cost of motor-vehicle deaths, injuries, and property damage in 2012 was $276.6 billion, a 5% increase from 2011. The costs include wage and productivity losses, medical expenses, administrative expenses, employer costs, and property damage.

The deadliest month on the roads was July, followed by August and June. The safest: February — not a surprise, since it’s the shortest month.

The NSC also provided state-by-state data, which is revealing. Last November, we looked at a report suggesting that red states were more likely to experience traffic deaths. That report used preliminary data — but the data released yesterday seems to reinforce the idea. You wouldn’t notice it looking at the raw, per-state data, however.

Speaking of:

Deaths per month

Darker shades mean higher overall numbers. Not surprisingly, states with larger populations have more road deaths. (There was no data for Vermont.) This doesn’t tell us very much.

Population per road death per month

In the map above, a lighter color means a bigger number, which is good — it suggests that there are fewer road deaths as a function of population. Montana, Wyoming, the Dakotas, New Mexico, and the South have more road deaths by population than many other states — reinforcing the link between red states and traffic deaths. New York’s rate of death as a function of population is relatively low.

Rate of change since 2011

Darker shades mean an increase in the number of deaths; lighter shades mean a decrease. Interestingly, the Northeast has seen a larger increase in the number of road deaths than many other regions. Two adjacent states saw the biggest changes — South Dakota went up, Wyoming went down — but this is largely because they have small populations, making percentages more volatile.

The moral of the story is this: If you don’t want to die in a car accident, move to New York. Or go back in time to 2011. Or don’t leave the house. All viable options.

Philip Bump writes about the news for Gristmill. He also uses Twitter a whole lot.

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Obama confirms: No big moves on climate in the works

by Obeey99 Posted on February 15, 2013

Obama confirms: No big moves on climate in the works

By Philip Bump

The White House

Based on conversations with senior White House officials this week, we reported that the president’s State of the Union threat to act unilaterally on climate change didn’t appear to have any force behind it. The largest weapon Obama has to that effect is the power to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from existing power plants — something that officials suggested isn’t in the works.

Yesterday, Politico asked the president directly what he’s planning to do about climate change:

Obama said in his State of the Union address that he is prepared to take action if Congress doesn’t act, but he didn’t detail what that action might look like. He hinted during the chat Thursday that it could resemble what his administration did to require higher fuel efficiency standards in automobiles.

“The same steps that we took with respect to energy efficiency on cars, we can take on buildings, we can take on appliances, we can make sure that new power plants that are being built are more efficient than the old ones, and we can continue to put research and our support behind clean energy that is going to continue to help us transition away from dirtier fuels,” he said.

As we noted on Wednesday, the administration’s action to increase fuel-efficiency standards for cars was a good one that will have a significant effect on greenhouse-gas and particulate pollution. But it is also a very different political fight than the one over emissions from existing power plants, and far less important.

In other words: Obama himself confirms that he’s not prepared to take drastic action in the absence of Congress doing anything. His threat, as we suggested two days ago, is empty.

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Obama acknowledges climate-change difficulties, Politico

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Which Species Die—or Kill—for Love?

by Myrna Posted on February 14, 2013

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Bloomberg proposes banning plastic foam containers, probably because they can hold soda

by d2wk58 Posted on February 14, 2013

Bloomberg proposes banning plastic foam containers, probably because they can hold soda

By Philip Bump

When I was a kid, you could come to New York City and buy a big soda in a large styrofoam cup. (You could also get murdered a lot more easily or score some drugs or afford a place in Soho, but that’s not my point here.) Big soda kept cool in a nice big cup — paradise, in its way.

Reuters / Eduardo Munoz

Last year, Mayor Michael Bloomberg decided that the big soda had to go. And this year, according to reports, he’s got his eyes on that cup. From Bloomberg (the media company, not the mayor for whom the company is named) (New York is a complicated place) (the city, not the state from which the city is named):

In his final State of the City address today, the third-term mayor will attempt to cement his legacy as a leader who made the most-populous U.S. city healthier and more environmentally friendly. His office previewed portions of the speech that focused on three initiatives intended to boost air quality, recycling rates and sustainability.

A requirement that 20 percent of all newly constructed public parking spaces be outfitted to charge electric vehicles would create 10,000 such spots within seven years. The plan would need City Council approval. A pilot program to collect curbside food waste from Staten Island homes to use as compost for parks would expand citywide if successful, cutting down on the 1.2 million tons of scraps sent to landfills each year.

(Apparently the city could use more charging stations.)

These are significant initiatives but, as suggested above, it’s the mayor’s proposed ban on Styrofoam cups and containers that’s gotten much of the attention. It fits nicely with the image of Bloomberg as anti-fast-food, but he will note that it’s actually anti-trash. As the Bloomberg article notes, New Yorkers throw away 20,000 tons of plastic foam a year. While the city’s garbage production is in decline, that’s still a lot of waste.

Bloomberg gave his State of the City address on a stage at Brooklyn’s new, leaky Barclays Center under sports-arena-appropriate banners celebrating his accomplishments. “419: Record Low in Homicides in 2012.” “52 Million: Record Visitors in 2012.” And one he’s put specific focus on: “80.9: Record High Life Expectancy.”

Not listed: “7 million: Fewer pounds of garbage a day.” Perhaps because he’s waiting for that number to improve a little more.

Philip Bump writes about the news for Gristmill. He also uses Twitter a whole lot.

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2013 will be a banner year for farm profits, according to analysis that ignores the drought

by wqds234der Posted on February 12, 2013

2013 will be a banner year for farm profits, according to analysis that ignores the drought

By Philip Bump

2012 was a brutal year for American farmers. The massive drought meant that the Department of Agriculture paid out $15 billion in crop insurance; prices of staple crops skyrocketed as yields plummeted.

It appears, however, that this was the darkness before the dawn. A new estimate from the USDA suggests that 2013 will be the most profitable year for farmers in four decades. From The Wall Street Journal:

The Department of Agriculture projected in a report Monday that net farm income in the U.S. will reach $128.2 billion in 2013—the highest since 1973 when adjusted for inflation and the highest on record on a non-adjusted basis.

The rosier outlook is driven by expectations farmers will grow more corn and soybeans after last year’s drought. Analysts predict increases in production will more than offset any price declines and rising costs, with the agency seeing corn stockpiles rising by more than 2 billion bushels.

The forecast also reflects a continued boom in the farm belt initially fueled by rising global demand for grains and increased mandates for corn-based ethanol.

And the first thing those farmers will do is repay the USDA for its crop insurance outlays in 2012, I assume. After all, it was God who made a farmer, not the USDA.

Shutterstock

There is, however, a great big caveat in the government’s predictions.

The USDA’s forecast for 2013 is based on historical yield averages and doesn’t take into account current weather conditions. Parts of the Midwest, such as Indiana and Illinois, have seen a return in moisture, but much of the Great Plains, including Nebraska and Kansas, remain in drought.

“If we don’t get some above-normal rainfall through the next few months, we are going to enter the [growing] season very, very dry,” said Steve Nelson, president of the Nebraska Farm Bureau, who grows corn and soybeans in the south central part of the state.

An estimate in January suggested that the 2012 drought has already turned into the 2013 drought, and is likely to last until April.

So how much crop insurance should we put you all down for?

Philip Bump writes about the news for Gristmill. He also uses Twitter a whole lot.

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Shell retreats from the Arctic, sending its battered vessels to Asia for repair

by 1LymSlagter473 Posted on February 12, 2013

Shell retreats from the Arctic, sending its battered vessels to Asia for repair

By Philip Bump

You know how in movies there’s sometimes a moment after some cataclysm in which the protagonist sits up in bed or steps out of a doorway, rubs his eyes, and the sun is shining? All around him are crumbled buildings and cars missing doors, but he looks up and the air is still and the sun is out and you, the audience, understand that something has changed. The terror is behind us.

Well, sit up in bed and rub your eyes. From the Times:

In another blow to its Alaskan Arctic drilling program, Royal Dutch Shell said on Monday that it had decided to tow its two drill vessels there to Asian ports for major repairs, jeopardizing its plans to begin drilling for oil in the icy northern seas next summer.

The new potential delay in drilling does not necessarily doom Shell’s seven-year, $4.5 billion quest to open a new oil frontier in the far north, but it may strengthen the position of environmentalists who have repeatedly sued to stop or postpone exploration that they claim carries the risks of a spill nearly impossible to clean up. …

For drilling to proceed, two vessels are needed, one to stand by to drill relief wells in case of a blowout. It would be difficult to find other suitable ships for drilling in the Arctic.

kullukresponse

The

Kulluk

during happier times.

The two vessels Shell is sending out for repair are the Kulluk — which ran aground in December, damaging its hull — and the Noble Discoverer — which escaped its moorings and almost ran aground, but needs fixes to its propulsion systems.

It is amusing (and largely warranted) to blame Shell for all of these mistakes. It is also worth questioning the role that the Arctic itself played. The vessels are old (the Times notes that the Kulluk was built in 1983; Discoverer in 1966), but the Arctic is also a notoriously harsh environment. One of the long-standing objections to drilling there is how hard it is to mobilize resources in a remote and forbidding environment, concerns reiterated loudly after the Kulluk grounding.

Shell is retreating, tail between its legs — at least for 2013. The company’s move into the region was something of an exploration anyway, the Vasco de Gama of Arctic oil drilling. The Arctic will someday be teeming with activity as the ice recedes; The Economist magazine is hosting a conference in Oslo next month titled, “Arctic Summit: A new vista for trade, energy, and the environment.” Shell wanted to be first; no one expected it to be the only one there.

Which brings us back to the movie analogy. Sometimes, when our hero is taking his first calm breath in days, closing his eyes to feel the sun on his face, free from the threats he’s defeated, another, bigger enemy is lurking just out of sight. In a moment, the hero’s eyes snap open, and the fight resumes.

Philip Bump writes about the news for Gristmill. He also uses Twitter a whole lot.

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Celebrities to Obama: Fix the climate! Obama to celebrities: Sure, you got it

by sreg2 Posted on February 11, 2013

Celebrities to Obama: Fix the climate! Obama to celebrities: Sure, you got it

By Philip Bump

Can Evangeline Lilly, Ian Somerhalder, Malin Akerman, and Phillipe Cousteau succeed where others have failed? I don’t know. I don’t know who those people are. I’m guessing the last is Jacques’ son, and Lilly is an actress, I’m pretty sure, but I’m not going to Google her.

These are some of the 24 (!!!) celebrities who have signed a letter to the president initiated by the Sierra Club. It quotes Obama’s inaugural speech and then reads:

An ad featuring the letter. Click to see big PDF version.

Your legacy as 44th president of the United States rests ﬁrmly on your leadership on climate disruption. Only the president has the power to lead an effort on the scale and with the urgency we need to phase out fossil fuels and lead America, and the world, in a clean energy revolution.

WE SUPPORT YOUR DEMONSTRATING THE STRONGEST RESOLVE IN FIGHTING THE CLIMATE CRISIS ON EVERY FRONT.

Emphasis and capitalization in the original because pay attention, Obama.

The ad ran in the D.C.-politics-focused The Hill, which I’m not sure Obama reads. But maybe! If not, he’ll probably read this post, anyway.

And when he does, he’ll count the celebrities listed and put them into his calculator. Adam Levine is famous enough to represent 10,000 Americans; Linkin Park, 18. He’ll total it up, and if it passes the figure he’s set for “Taking Action on Climate Change” in his Excel spreadsheet — whammo. Leadership.

Philip Bump writes about the news for Gristmill. He also uses Twitter a whole lot.

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