So there's a lot of confusion about CA gas prices [1]. Often this is simply blamed on greedy oil companies. While I'm no fan of oil companies, to understand this you need to know that CA uses its own gas mix [2]. In reality there are two factors in play here:
1. Permanent loss of refning capacity for CA's gas mix (as noted in this article); and
2. CA could change the law to use the same gas as the rest of the country, which would probably cut gas prices by ~$1/gallon.
The special gas mix was originally created because of smog issues in places like CA but improved fuel and pollution standards in cars have rendered that larely obsolte.
I can only guess why (2) doesn't happen but a good educated guess is that Newsom has presidential hopes in 2028 and doesn't want to pick a fight with the environmental wing of the Democratic Party.
So remember that: high CA gas prices are a choice.
> The special gas mix was originally created because of smog issues in places like CA but improved fuel and pollution standards in cars have rendered that larely obsolete.
That's an interesting claim. Are you claiming (1) that there are no places in California that have problematic smog levels, such that reducing smog is obsolete as a goal, or (2) that the changes you reference haven't just moved the pollution baseline down but actually changed the relevant mechanisms so that the California formulation no longer reduces emissions in the current mix of cars on the road in California?
And, for either, where is the evidence in support of the claim?
> I can only guess why (2) doesn't happen but a good educated guess is that Newsom has presidential hopes in 2028 and doesn't want to pick a fight with the environmental wing of the Democratic Party.
You leave out two important points:
(1) California is not an executive dictatorship, Newsom couldn't unilaterally mandate that no matter who he was willing to pick a fight with, but more importantly,
(2) To abandon using reformulated gasoline for a large portion (by population) of the State, who he'd need to pick a fight with is the US federal government, because the urban counties of Southern California are under an EPA mandate due to air quality:
If I were king, I would swap for the regular formulation again, and add a $1 a gallon state tax, and use that to invest in the electrical grid and public charging.
> If I were king, I would swap for the regular formulation again, and add a $1 a gallon state tax,
You'd need to be king of an independent California to do that, otherwise, for much of the population of you would increase the base cost of their (still reformulated) gas and add a tax on top of tthat, because reformulated gas is federally mandated for a large (by population) portion of the state, and narrowing the reformulated market to the counties under federal mandate would drive up gas prices (before the tax increase) there.
1. Permanent loss of refning capacity for CA's gas mix (as noted in this article); and
2. CA could change the law to use the same gas as the rest of the country, which would probably cut gas prices by ~$1/gallon.
The special gas mix was originally created because of smog issues in places like CA but improved fuel and pollution standards in cars have rendered that larely obsolte.
I can only guess why (2) doesn't happen but a good educated guess is that Newsom has presidential hopes in 2028 and doesn't want to pick a fight with the environmental wing of the Democratic Party.
So remember that: high CA gas prices are a choice.
[1]: https://gasprices.aaa.com/state-gas-price-averages/
[2]: https://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-gasoline-manipulation...