Wednesday, October 26, 2022

It Begins: New York, New England Begin Rationing Heating Oil—Before Peak Winter Has Even Hit


Bob Hoge reporting for RedState 

Biden’s war on oil has consequences, and now the chickens are coming home to roost. We’ve already gotten a taste of it nationwide with persistent, sky-high gas prices. In California, we felt it this summer as our power grid was stretched to capacity by heat waves and we were subject to rolling brown-outs along with warnings not to use appliances or charge electric cars. How very First World.

(As an aside, every year when there’s a heat wave in Southern Cal, the enviros go whacko and scream, “Climate change! Climate change!” And yet every year that I’ve lived here for the past 30 years there’s been a heat wave in September. Wonder if it could be… the weather?)

Now the Northeast is going to feel it too as a new enemy arrives: winter. Bloomberg is reporting that the rationing of heating oil is already underway, despite it not even yet being November.

The reason: stockpiles are at 30 percent of their normal levels.

DailyMail reports that Chris Herb, president of the Connecticut Energy Marketers Association, said that heating oil wholesalers are limiting allocations to retail suppliers:

The rationing measures, intended to prevent panic buying and hoarding, are in turn being imposed on consumers, limiting the amount of heating oil they can purchase.

Not only will heating oil be rationed, but it will also take a harder hit on your wallet:

In addition to the scarcity, there’s also the cost. Wholesale heating oil in New York Harbor averaged $4.09 a gallon on Thursday, compared with $2.46 at the same time a year ago, according to data from price reporting agency Argus Media. For the wholesaler, that means it costs about $1,125 to fill up a 275-gallon heating oil tank, the typical size used in many homes. But consumers will pay well over that figure after markups by the wholesaler and retailer.

The bottom line? Americans will pay almost 30 percent more to heat their homes than last year—the most in 25 years.

Biden will continue to blame Vladimir Putin and the invasion of Ukraine for our oil woes, and scold Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for refusing to bend the knee and pump more oil, but it’s Joe’s own fault we’re in this mess.

When former President Donald Trump was in office, the U.S. was energy independent. Joe Biden made his priorities clear on day one when he canceled the Keystone pipeline, and he’s continued on his quest to make America subservient to foreign dictators’ oil and chase his delusional “green” dream ever since. In case you’re confused, the safety and security of Americans are not part of that dream.

By the time truly harsh winter rolls around to the Northeast in January and February, the midterms will be but a memory, and it won’t be until 2024 again when voters can express their displeasure.

Let’s hope they’re paying attention now and will let the Democrats know what they think of rationing in peacetime America on November 8. We can’t get rid of Joe on election day, but we can toss a whole bunch of his acolytes out so that he’s less able to hurt working people.