This editorial from the major daily Montreal Gazette gets it: Big Oil’s deliberate restriction of refinery capacity and gasoline stocks drives up the pump price and fills the bulging treasuries of the major oil companies. The editorial rightly scorns the excuses given in oil company news releases:
This week it’s scheduled maintenance before the high-demand season that’s to blame for prices climbing back into the $1.10 range.
Other times it’s unscheduled maintenance, or the high-demand season itself, or sometimes some kind of bafflegab about "market fluctuations" or "profit-margin adjustments."
Interestingly, the phrase "record oil company profits" never seems to make it into the explanatory press releases from industry experts.
The editorial goes on to note that a “not very big refinery fire” recently threw the Ontario gasoline market into chaos. And it argues that “scheduled maintenance shouldn’t have any effect at all on prices.”
What should be done? “More refining capacity might not cut gasoline prices, but it could at least put pressure on Big Oil to come up with some new excuses.”
That’s mild language and well short of calling for government to regulate the gasoline supply, force the industry to be more transparent and update antitrust laws to prevent price-gouging. But it’s also far from the relative silence and timidity of major U.S. editorialists.