An alternate headline for this story:
States Sue Because Gas is Too Cheap
Restrictions on refineries, after all, come with a price on the end product. Ask anyone who's had to pay for a catalytic converter about the hidden cost of efficiency regulations.
Monday, August 25, 2008
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2 comments:
Oh, come on! So taking action on global warming is not costless. So is doing nothing about a looming disaster. It's fair enough to engage in cost-benefit analysis. Not all measures intended to help the environment are necessarily worth the cost. But to look only at the cost is as misleading as environmentalists' tendancy to look only at the benefits.
This is true, but I bring it up because the cost of refining gas is a direct, significant part of the price of fuel at the pump - and there was a great deal of noise made this year over the price of gas.
My intention is not to say that there are only costs, but rather to connect the two - that further burdening refiniries will have the direct, unavoidable consequence of raising the price of gas.
The twin complaints of some people - politicians in particular - that gas is too expensive and that refining/drilling/doing anything with gasoline is bad are related. Refinery capacity in particular is responsible for regular predictable fluctuations in the price of gas when there is even the smallest unforseen outage.
This is not to say that there are no benefits or that an analysis is not needed, but rather that every politician calling for oil industry regulation is a bold-faced liar about the real impact that has on his constituents or they are fools instead.
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