Is it all because of the pumps having no power? I feel like an idiot asking this, but all I’ve seen is the Who, What, and When.
Many of the gas stations were without power. No power, no pump. That put pressure on the stations that did have power which led to long lines and short tempers. Mass transit was down so more people needed to use their cars. Taxis, which need gas, were in short supply.
Gas stations take up a lot of space so there are not a lot of them in Manhattan. They tend to be in areas where the cost of real estate isn’t exorbitant. That means they are in lower density neighborhoods. Con Ed, the power company, is of course going to try to get power back up in the highest density neighborhoods first. Put all this together and you get a crisis, as if there already wasn’t one.
nitpick: NY, NJ, and CT.
Also, as I understand it, the condition of the roads makes it difficult to get the trucks from the storage tanks to the gas stations, which compounds the problem even more.
In some places, the stations have gas, but the pumps have no power. But there were other, bigger problems. Tankers were not allowed into the harbor for a couple of days after the storm and processing plants had no power so that even stations with power weren’t getting deliveries. People were traveling into NYC ( where stations generally had power ) from Long Island ( where lots of stations lost power) and maybe even Connecticut and New Jersey to get gas which caused the lines and stations running out. And then people started traveling north, and that affected the supplies in Rockland and Westchester counties. That all probably would have caused slightly longer lines - except there was no new gas in the pipeline.
Same principle applies. No power no pump. Pressure on the few stations that do have power. In the outer boroughs, NJ and CT they are even more reliant on their cars which means gas is much more critical to their transportation needs.
The port was closed for a while, disrupting supply a bit there. And there is no-doubt additional demand from people who have no gird power and are running generators.
I doubt that it’s any one single factor so much as that the area is heavily populated and uses a lot of gas and the only buffer between supply and demand is the storage tanks of the gas stations that have electricity. Even in ordinary times the region needs constant resupply to stay gassed up and due to the limited on-site inventory, the tolerances are tight enough that even a minor supply disruption has a big impact.
Maybe I missed it, but I wasn’t aware that all major routes were impassable. Are there overpasses down? Pavement ripped up in all Interstates? No alternate routes from, say, Louisiana to NY?
Ships with oil aren’t the only way to deliver fuel. Why didn’t a convoy of tanker trucks start out from the nearest working refinery immediately after the winds died down and head for NY? Even if they had to come from Texas, they would be there in two days; from Pennsylvania, less than a day.
I find it difficult to understand why the oil company executives didn’t plan for this 3 weeks ago, when Sandy was only a speck in the Caribbean. Why didn’t they start loading trucks and heading for New England? For that matter, unless they felt that the storm would damage a full tanker, why didn’t they park them right in the expected affected area, ready to roll, possibly with portable generators to lend out?
May not be worth the cost.
I have a friend who argues against anti-price-gouging laws partly on bases like this.
There is not an unlimited supply of tanker trucks sitting around unused. Setting out with a convoy of trucks from one location simply means they are not available to meet the needs of their home area. If it takes a day for that truck to make the trip to the affected area then it misses several deliveries in its home zone which moves and compounds the shortage.
Has this ever happened in the history of hurricane preparation in this country? Having lived in a hurricane-prone state for my entire life, I have never seen anyone roll gas tankers into an area on standby for an eventual possible mid-length gas shortage.
Also, having seen the damage in photos and videos, I can’t imagine a tanker shearing open and throwing gas everywhere would have possibly improved anything.
You fill your car up before the storm hits and hope for the best after, and do your best not to drive more than absolutely necessary until the gas comes back. It sucks but that’s unfortunately how it goes.
Higher demand is part of it, not just from people who own cars but normally use public transportation but also because of the people who lost grid power and had to switch to gasoline-powered generators.
So the oil companies had absolutely no contingency plans? No flexibility as to truck assignments? No spare trucks, even ones under repair, that could have been rushed into service temporarily?
Remember, this was not a disaster that could not be anticipated weeks in advance. The weather services, although they could not say with absolute certainty where and when the hurricane would hit, became increasingly certain that it would be a major storm, even under the best case.
See my note above.
Neither can I. Is that what happens in storms? Is that a major consideration? How many MPH winds would be required for that to happen? Couldn’t loaded trucks be staged just outside the worst areas, only a day away from the delivery area?
All of which the oil companies should be able to anticipate. Again, this was not a sudden, unexpected, overnight tornado affecting a small area. It was forecasted weeks in advance for a broad area that was gradually narrowed as time went on.
For that matter, since wise people will indeed fill up their auto tanks in advance of need, I would think the oil companies would make an extra effort to fill up the gas station tanks more than usual. Rather than rushing to fill them afterwards, they could have filled them before. Again, this was not an unanticipated event.
Did the oil companies forget about emergency generators, human panic, and other common events? Can’t they work with organizations like the Red Cross and FEMA to mitigate disasters? Did the Red Cross tell the oil companies that no special effort was needed?
Also, why couldn’t someone lend a generator(s) to affected gas stations so their pumps could work? I would imagine that when the crisis abbates and gov’t leaders convene to learn lessons on how to mitigate future weather disasters maybe something like this could be addressed.
Having lived through more than one hurricane and tropical storm, I’ve seen winds put a 2x4 clean through a tree trunk. I’ve seen cars picked up and put down hundreds of yards away by flood. I’ve seen boats end up in people’s back yards. Wind and water are unbelievably powerful.
And what does “a day away” mean? We’ve been hit by storms big enough to cover the entire peninsula of Florida. Miami is a day away from Tallahassee even under good conditions, so where exactly should we consider “a day away” when you have an entire state under threat?
Gas shortages are a frequent outcome of hurricanes. It’s part of life in the hurricane-prone part of the US, and I feel bad for her NE cause they’re not used to this nor are their homes and infrastructure built to withstand it.
Just speculating, but I wonder if a lot of the shortage is being caused by the perception of a shortage. Of the 3 people I know who waited for hours to buy gas, two of them had 3/4 of a tank left. One of them had 1/2 of a tank left.
Normally under such circumstances, most people do not buy gas.
That’s absolutely part of it , just like it always is for the traditional run on bread,milk and toilet paper ( why toilet paper, I don’t know) right before any significant weather event.
Because the subway and bus and commuter rail system were all shut down, in the immediate aftermath of the storm, people drove places they don’t normally drive, because they use public transit on the average day. So between that and running generators, people needed a lot more gas than they normally do.
Add that to reduced ability to resupply because NJ refineries went offline, reduced ability to transport gasoline (because many of the river crossings were impassable and New Jersey was kinda fucked), and the fact that highly populous NYC does not have a lot of gas stations, and you have a problem.
Talking to people I haven’t heard that there are lots of gas stations with gas but without the power to pump it. Within NYC at least, most places are just out of gas and don’t know when their next delivery will come.
So because it’s “part of life,” you shouldn’t prepare for it as best you can?
And while you can’t rebuild a house stronger in a week, you can stage emergency supplies closer than a week away, especially if you have advance notice.
And this could not be anticipated?
And this could not be anticipated?
And this could not be anticipated? By individual stations and/or delivery facilities?
If I owned a gas station, and had 2 weeks warning of a possible storm, then 1 week warning of a highly likely storm, and all I needed was to refill my tanks and buy a portable generator for $2000, I think I would have seriously considered it. Especially if all the other grasshoppers around me weren’t – I’d have mucho sales to their none!
That’s not altruism, it’s just simple profit motive. And maybe some stations did just that, I really don’t know. More power (and profit) to them if they did.