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Biden’s EPA Holds Up Major Oil Refinery Amid National Fuel Crisis
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Thursday announced that a large idled refinery in the U.S. Virgin Islands will remain shut down until it acquires a new Clean Air Act permit amid a national diesel shortage.
The St. Croix refinery, owned by West Indies Petroleum Limited and Port Hamilton Refining and Transportation, LLLC, has been shut down since June 2021 and will have to obtain a Prevention of Significant Deterioration permit which would require the operators to provide detailed air quality analyses and use sophisticated air pollution control technology, according to the EPA press release. At the same time, the U.S. only has 26 days of diesel remaining in its commercial inventories and a gallon of diesel is roughly $1.58 more expensive than it was in November 2021, according to the Energy Information Administration (EIA). (RELATED: The Country Is In The Middle Of A Diesel Crisis — And The Biden Admin Is Making It Worse, Experts Say)
The refinery, which was once one of the largest refineries in the world, used to be able to process 600,000 barrels of crude oil per day into gasoline and heating oil, a form of diesel, according to Bloomberg. The price of heating oil was 65% higher in October 2022 than it was in October 2021 [and about double what it was in 2020 — ED] meaning that Americans in the Northeast of the country will pay significantly more to keep their homes warm during the cold winter months, according to the EIA.
Energy Secretary Jenifer Granholm is ecstatic. “This is fabulous news”, she told FWIW, “because, like the gasoline hikes we’ve engineered, it will force the immediate transformation of our country’s energy structure. No more trucks, for instance, delivering wasteful symbols of capitalist excess over roads paved with oil-based asphalt. Instead, what products are deemed necessary by the commissars will be brought to central distribution points using great, big air barges made from recycled paper and floated by the wind, lofted aloud by lovely pink balloons made from, made from, well not plastic, certainly! Tee hee! We’ll think of something.
“Now, all of this will take time to acccomplish,” she cautioned, “possibly as long as six months, and we recognize that the lack of heat this winter may cause some hardship among a few of our citizens. But we do have a solution: today I’m proud to announce that the Biden Administration has appointed former Governor Andrew Cuomo to lead and coordinate a “Stay Warm, Don’t Die” dancing program for patients in nursing homes, just like Germany’s. Are we done here? I know I am.”