Santa Monica, CA – Consumer advocates revealed an investor slide presentation by Texas-based oil company Tesoro explaining that oil refiners keep gasoline supplies especially tight on the West Coast to keep profits high through higher…
Blog Post
Archive | Author: Doug Heller
Blog Post
California Pension Funds Should Divest From Price Gouging Oil Firms Behind Prop 23
Consumer Watchdog has called on California’s two large public employee pension funds — CalPERS and CalSTRS — to sell off their holdings in Valero Energy and Tesoro, the big oil refiners behind Prop 23. The…
Report
Study: Texas-Based Valero Gouging California Drivers For A Decade
A new report by Oil Watchdog finds that Valero Energy reaped over $4.5 billion in refining profit while gouging California motorists since it bought its second California refinery in 2002. The oil refining giant, which is also the largest funder of Proposition 23, averaged 37% higher margins on each barrel of oil it refined in California than at refineries it owns elsewhere in the country, according to data published in company financial reports.
Oil industry gusher: lobbying expenses
If the oil industry wasn’t able to spend 175 million dollars sweet talking, wining and dining Members of Congress, who can imagine the havoc society would face: increased oversight of offshore drilling operations, pollution limits, regulation of refinery supply. The horror, the horror.
Blog Post
The Other Oil Addiction: Politicians Love That Tax Revenue
If you want to know (another) reason politicians don’t really want to step in and take action to lower gas prices, check this out from Associated Press on California’s current budget debate: The budget adopted…
Blog Post
Gov’t Staffer Takes First Class Flight to Corporate Job
The Executive Director of the California Public Utilities Commission, Steve Larson, announced that he was leaving the PUC to take a job at the Australian oil giant Woodside, according to Mark Martin, who is reporting…
Blog Post
I could fill up 10 million times with Oxy CEO’s salary
It was the mathematical symmetry of the number that got to me. It costs me about $46 to fill up my Honda at a California gas station these days ($3.28 for unleaded according to AAA). …