[Source: Ronald Stein, P.E.] California lawmakers are at it again. A 2018 bill, SB 1074, sponsored by State Senator John Moorlach (R) from Costa Mesa and championed by the minority party in the State was effectively bottom drawered by the ruling party, the Democrats. They are now fueling the idea, pun intended, that the oil companies are filling their pockets with the extra money California consumers experience at the pump. The local media are unknowing co-conspirators in this ruse.
The current rhetoric the legislature is putting out is they can’t explain why the cost of gas at the pump in California is noticeably higher, hovering around a dollar, than the rest of the country. They’ve called for the Attorney General’s office to investigate this phenomenon. Yeah, like the AG’s not in bed with the idea that the Oil and Gas industry is the go-to scape goat, the established bad guy, the Snidely Whiplash who can be blamed for any and everything that goes wrong today and tomorrow anywhere in the great State of California.
Cap and trade went into effect in 2013, following the earlier Low Carbon Fuel Standard and the Renewable Fuel Standard. Now the Attorney General’s office and the legislature’s designated talking heads say they can’t seem to figure out why the prices jumped considerably. The people who make the laws and spin the tales decide the angle of the truth they want you to hear. Besides, they don’t want to have to explain what cap and trade is for the hundredth time after President Trump has literally designated it a bad word.
Because Cap and Trade and other environmental regulations are the Gold Rush State’s atta-boy when it comes to their green direction initiatives, mentioning it as part culprit would take some of the pressure off their designated evil-doer, Oil and Gas.
With the summer blend of fuel costs hitting the pumps, lawmakers are once again getting press about challenging why Californians continue to pay almost $1.00 more per gallon of fuel than the rest of the country. Some of the costs hidden in the all-in posted price of fuel at the pump are:
- Federal tax per gallon
- Excise tax per gallon
- State tax per gallon
- Local sales tax per gallon
- Cap and trade program compliance costs per gallon
- Low-carbon fuel standard program compliance costs per gallon
- Renewable fuels standard program compliance costs per gallon
- Refinery winter and summer reformatting costs per gallon
As the Cap & Trade and Low Carbon Fuel Standard Programs kick into higher gear in the coming years, more costs onto fuels are projected by 2030 which may add another dollar or two to the per gallon fuel cost consumers will pay at the pump.
SB 1074 would have required gas stations to post near each gas and diesel pump a list of cost factors, such as federal, state and local taxes, as well as costs associated with environmental rules and regulations including the cap-and-trade tax, low-carbon fuel standard, and the renewable fuels standard.
The difference between those “fixed” governmental costs from taxes and environmental regulations would obviously explain the total costs the manufacturers of those fuels charge the vendors who add their markup and adjust the actual price the consumer experiences at the pump. That’s a lot of taxes and costs.
Beginning last November 2018, SB 1 added 12 cents to a gallon of gasoline and 20 cents to each gallon of diesel for infrastructure improvements, and now we’re looking at even more costs for the upcoming “summer blend” for fuels.
Numerous laypersons and organization spokespersons weighed in in support of Senator Moorlach’s bill at an April 23, 2018 hearing before the State Senate Committee on Business, Professions and Economic Development. I testified myself. But the Democratic-controlled committee was very vocal that they didn’t want the public to know why we’re paying so much and voted to kill the transparency bill from future consideration. Chuckleheads.
Hiding details of costs to the public provides a better understanding of why California suffers the highest percentage of people in poverty and a homeless crisis so acute it shocks the world.
- California has 25% of the homeless in the nation and double the national average of homeless per 1000 persons.
- State by State Poverty rates, geographically adjusted, places California highest in the nation at 23.8%.
The transparency bill SB 1074 would have given motorists information on what’s really going on. But for the Democratic supermajority in the Legislature, bliss is keeping Californians ignorant. As expected, the current vocal concerns of lawmakers will get discussed again and again, but action toward transparency to the public will be avoided.
Source: Ronald Stein, P.E., Founder and Ambassador for Energy & Infrastructure of PTS Advance, headquartered in Irvine, California. Published February 4, 2019, at Fox & Hounds.
