Guest Columnist – Sub: Let’s set the record straight when it comes to gas prices

The opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by our guest columnists do not reflect the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints of this publication.

Antonieta Cadiz

Latino Affairs- Climate Power

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Each one of us has felt it. Prices at the pump and energy bills are stretching our budgets thin and, for the 83% of Latino households in the United States that own at least one vehicle, the situation surely feels unsustainable. In this moment of pressure, Big Oil and Gas CEOs see opportunity. Their business plan remains centered on maximizing profits and spreading disinformation, so they can keep drilling, even while it poisons communities of color. So, it’s time to blow this cloud of lies away.

Less production?

The first lie circulating is that climate regulations and the push for clean energy has impacted the oil and gas supply. That is NOT TRUE. Oil companies were underperforming and struggling with excessive debt before the Biden administration even started its first day. Furthermore, much of the industry had already started to cut production and lay off employees. When oil prices collapsed in 2020 because of COVID, the oil and gas industry both at home and around the world responded by further slashing production. More than 100,000 workers were laid off in the United States despite nearly $120 billion in government support for the industry. Most of these layoffs happened in Latino-heavy states like California and Texas, which impacted the over 8,000 Latinos employed by the industry in a disproportionate way.

Higher prices, higher profits.

The oil and gas industry has blamed the Biden administration and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as the main drivers for higher prices at the pump. The reality is that they are more focused on profits than American consumers. This is particularly harmful for communities of color, especially Latinos who are feeling a disproportionate impact on their wallets since they spend more of their monthly income on fuel. The difficult geopolitical moment we are in has generated enormous cash flows to big oil CEOs. Exxon Mobil, Chevron, Shell, BP, and ConocoPhillips all saw their highest annual profits in at least 7 years, bringing in a total of $78.8 billion in 2021 across just these five companies. Ordinarily, a rebound in prices would incentivize oil companies to invest in more production, but right now the industry is choosing to keep supply tight and prices high so they can send $88 billion back to shareholders through stock buybacks ($38bln) and dividends ($50bln).

More permits…. Really?

The oil and gas industry likes to push the administration for more permits to drill on public lands, arguing that this is one of the biggest reasons behind oil prices spiking. HOWEVER, oil and gas companies are already sitting on a decade’s worth of unused leases and drilling permits. By the end of fiscal year 2021, the number of drilling permits issued by the Bureau of Land Management was 10 times the number of active drilling rigs that oil companies actually had in operation (5,000 permits vs 508 rigs). As of September 30, 2021, the oil and gas industry held 9,600 approved onshore permits that are ready to drill.

Climate action is the solution

Over decades, every time we experience a global crisis, oil prices have spiked and the response from Big Oil is always ‘lets drill more.’ What have we accomplished with that? NOTHING, because we have patched our way out of it, instead of really healing this open wound for our economy, workers, and community as a whole.Keeping the status quo means our families continue to sacrifice their household budgets at the mercy of Oil and Gas CEOs. It’s the nature of the business. Oil company CEOs are motivated by maximizing profits and generating cash for shareholders, not by what keeps prices down at home. Oil and gas are traded on global markets, and unlike clean energy sources, fossil fuels can easily be loaded onto a boat and shipped to the highest bidder. Because of this, we will never be free from oil and gas price fluctuations no matter how much oil we drill at home.

The climate action provisions that are now waiting for Congress to act are precisely a solution to this crisis, and more to come if we dont change our dependence on oil. Provisions like clean energy tax credits for electric vehicles coupled with investments in cleaner transit, buses, and trucks that will help reduce climate pollution from the transportation sector while cleaning up our air and saving consumers money. Provisions that allow us to transition to a real energy economy driven by clean energy whose price is much more stable than fossil fuels, and cheaper, creating millions of good paying jobs for all Americans while saving consumers $500 a year on their energy bills. This is all possible, it can be real if we have leaders willing to step up to the Big Oil and Gas lobby, if we have leaders who care more about what is right rather than what is convenient for their campaign donations. The time has come to break the power of Big Oil and Gas so we can do what is right for all, not just a few.