XPost: alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, alt.computer.workshop
From: hotmail@hotmail.edu
Newscum strikes again!
Wonder why there is a mass exodus from CA?
No you don't.
"Gasoline-Starved California Is Turning to Fuel From the Bahamas"
"(Bloomberg) — US supplies of gasoline are being shipped out of the
country to travel thousands of miles via the Bahamas before finally
ending up in California, a state battling shrinking fuelmaking capacity
and high pump prices.
Shipments on the circuitous route are increasing. California imported
more gasoline in November than ever before, with more than 40% coming
from the Bahamas.
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The lengthy journey adds another layer of cost to California’s already
expensive gasoline market. Yet the phenomenon isn’t likely to disappear
soon, thanks to a combination of disappearing oil refineries, a lack of
interstate pipelines and a loophole in a 106-year-old maritime law.
California has among the strictest environmental regulations in the US,
making it costly for energy companies to operate in, though a wave of
upcoming refinery closures is prompting officials and regulators to
soften their stance. On average, the closures could raise the cost of
gasoline for consumers by between 5 and 15 cents a gallon, said Patrick
De Haan, GasBuddy’s head of petroleum analysis.
After Phillips 66 shuttered its Los Angeles refinery in October, gasoline
imports climbed in 2025 to the highest level since at least 2016, Vortexa
data show. With Valero Energy Corp. set to close a Northern California
refinery this spring, and no fuel pipelines connecting the US Gulf’s oil-
producing powerhouse to the West Coast, the nation’s most populous state
will likely depend on imports to bridge the gap.
Under the Jones Act, any goods shipped between US ports must travel on
US-built, owned and operated vessels. Those tankers are in short supply
and expensive to charter. There are about 55 Jones Act-compliant oil
tankers worldwide, compared with more than 7,000 oil tankers globally.
“Even if there are such vessels, they would charge more than a foreign-
flagged vessel would,” said Martin Davies, director of Tulane
University’s Maritime Law Center.
When California’s specialized gasoline trades at a premium, particularly
during refinery outages, Gulf Coast refiners can capture higher margins
by sending barrels west, De Haan said. Routing through the Bahamas allows
them to avoid higher-cost US-flagged shipping and preserve that spread.
In those moments, “there’s going to be plenty of incentive for PADD 3
(Gulf Coast) and Asian refiners to supply Californians,” De Haan said.
The trade has accelerated. Last year, California sourced more barrels of
gasoline from the Bahamas than it had in the prior nine years combined –
accounting for roughly 12% of gasoline arriving in California by ship all
year, including direct deliveries from elsewhere in the US, according to
Vortexa.
Imports of gasoline were down from their fall peak in January, according
to Vortexa. Japan and India both made up a greater proportion of foreign
supply — though the Bahamas was the third-leading non-US supplier.
Asia is a more practical source of gasoline for California, De Haan said,
noting that refineries in the region already produce gasoline blendstock
at the grade specifically required by California, and it can arrive
without paying to transit the Panama Canal. Both India and South Korea
supplied more product to California last year than the Bahamas.
The economic appeal of shipping US-refined gasoline on cheaper foreign
vessels has been waning in recent months, after the US eased sanctions on
Venezuela, a move that triggered an increase in regional freight prices.
Foreign ships, which were nearly $4 a barrel cheaper than US-flagged ones
in the past year, are now barely $1 cheaper, data from Argus Media show.
If freight costs continue to rise, shipments of US gasoline could become
too expensive to compete with supplies from South Korea or India.
Still, the Bahamian trade route, which began picking up steam in the
early months of 2025, has become a key piece of California’s troubled
supply chain. Already this year, two tankers carrying gasoline have
arrived in California from the Bahamas, according to customs data.
One of the most recent voyages was made by the Singapore-flagged Silver
Moon, which delivered nearly 300,000 barrels of gasoline blendstock to
the Los Angeles area in early January after loading in Freeport in mid-
December. The vessel transited the Panama Canal and was consigned to
Houston-based refiner Phillips 66. The company recently leased storage
tanks in the Bahamas, according to people with knowledge of the
situation.
Phillips 66 declined to comment.
Earlier this month, the Torm Dulce made the same voyage and delivered
gasoline blendstock to San Francisco. The path mirrors a longer-standing
workaround to bring fuel to the East Coast when it’s shipped outside
pipeline systems, said Matt Smith, lead oil analyst at Kpler.
“This is a trend we have seen become ingrained on the US East Coast:
barrels are shipped from the US Gulf Coast via the Bahamas as a way of
avoiding using Jones Act vessels,” Smith said. “It makes sense that this
is increasingly happening to the US West Coast given refinery retirements
and outages — and is a trend we expect to persist."
--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)
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