Hurricanes and Energy

[drscott]

excessor's grandma, aunt, and mother are holed up in his mom's house in Sugarland (west of Houston) and seem to be in good shape to ride out Rita, since it's tracking further east now.

I filled up my gas tank at $2.91 -- this should hold me for a month. Damage to the petro complex in the Houston area is expected to be severe, though not as severe as it looked yesterday. Shortages of refined products and a price spike are very likely. The worse problem is natural gas, which looks to be up 50-100% from last heating season. The US relies almost entirely on domestic and Canadian production, since siting LNG terminals has been politically impossible and low prices until recent years made it uneconomic to import. The under-Gulf network of pipelines which supplies a big chunk of US gas will be partly shut down for some time.

So this is the time to make any improvements to reduce home heating costs. Our bill will be about $1500 for heating, up from $900 last year, and it would have been higher if we hadn't put in double glazing. There are still things to be done, like an atrium skylight and some small windows.

Comments

[furfairy.livejournal.com]

Wow 2.91 is cheap! Did you do that in the south bay? The station here in Piedmont is 2.99. I noticed when I was driving ot Fremont for school that the gas down there is cheaper than it is in Oakland.

[excessor.livejournal.com]

$2.91 is about right here in the South Bay. On the peninsula, it's about $2.99.

[cjsmith.livejournal.com]

Ayup. Cheapest station I know of right now is on Bernardo (Sunnyvale) just south of El Camino, at 2.89. That's where I filled up this morning. That'll hold me for a couple weeks.

[excessor.livejournal.com]

That station is very near our house!

I filled up last night at the ARCO located on Shoreline at Middlefield. It, too, was $2.899.