Quote Originally Posted by Shaggy Hiker View Post
I believe those two blends are nationwide, not just in CA. That's part of the reason why the price of gas always rises heading towards Memorial Day. It's too far out for that to be the cause of the recent rises, but these rises have been too small to need a reason. Gas prices change. It happens. Trump never had a chance on that one. Oil production can't overcome lack of refinery capacity. Increasing refinery capacity isn't quick and it isn't cheap, so refinery operators only build new refinery infrastructure if they believe that there will be a long-term return on the investment. There's no evidence that they think that's a good investment at the moment, so drilling for oil gains nothing domestically.

Also, drilling in the US generally requires a price that ranges from 60-70 dollars/barrel. The price is around that, now, but only somewhat above that. Increased production decreases price. In the wild west days of the fracking boom, everybody was jumping in, so the price of oil dropped so far it sometimes even went negative (producers had to pay people to store it). That drove lots of companies out of business and drove the consolidation of others. Now, the remaining companies are more circumspect about drilling. Not too much, not too little.
I believe they said that it takes a while to change over from one blend to another. A couple of local refineries were down for the change and maintenance and there was a fire at another so our prices have been up more than usual.

Whether that's all true, I have no idea.