refineryworker05
Well-Known Member
Why politicians have little sway over gas prices - Marketplace
In an attempt to moderate oil and gas prices, Biden has asked OPEC to increase production, despite it being a function of market forces.
www.marketplace.org
But squeezing OPEC rarely works. It’s a powerful cartel that doesn’t have to lose too much sleep over rising gas prices in the United States. American politicians also have limited control at home, said Sara Vakhshouri, president of the oil and gas consultancy SVB Energy International.
“So, the U.S. government has no say really on how much the oil production should be,” she said.
That’s up to private energy firms, meaning Texas Gov. Abbott can’t just tell oil companies in the Permian Basin to start pumping to increase supply.
Clark Williams-Derry, an analyst at the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, said that at the moment, the U.S. oil industry is telling itself, “don’t overproduce, don’t pretend like today’s price blip is a great long-term opportunity. Exercise what they call ‘capital discipline.'”
Which, Williams-Derry said, is shorthand for just drill less.
“This is an industry that’s been burned again and again by overproduction. They respond to high prices by ramping up drilling. And then they wind up producing too much oil and gas and the prices come back down, and they don’t make the money they were expecting to,” he said.