Many are aware that there has been a shortage of gasoline for about ten days, with Middle Tennessee (Nashville area) appearing to be the focal point of the shortage.
There was this diary today.
There was this ridiculously condescending statement in an open thread on Saturday. It was based on a surprisingly uncritical reading of this stupid story on CNN.com.
There was also this diary on Saturday, based on this (now updated) story in the Tennessean.
Follow me.
First, the gas shortage first appeared on Friday, September 12, the day that Hurricane Ike was roaring onto the Gulf Coast of Texas. I filled my half-empty tank that morning because I remembered the price-spike after Hurricane Rita three years ago. I was just trying to save a few bucks. I think this is what a lot of other people did too. Perhaps some thought there might be a shortage, but this was not based on "a rumor." It was based on a real weather forecast. It is not unreasonable or "ignorant-redneckish" to think that a severe gulf hurricane could disrupt supply.
Second, the gas shortage persisted all last week. Some stations were getting new supplies, but were selling out very quickly. This seemed to peak late in the week as more and more people were running out of gas.
All along it seemed to me that there was a missing piece. The Tennessean article cited above talks about the Colonial pipeline that runs from the gulf to New York, passing through and supplying Nashville. Was it possible that Nashville got shorted to keep the northeast supplied? After all, a lot of stockbrokers in New York last week were going to need to run their cars for a long time inside their closed garages, if you know what I mean. Still, this did not seem like enough. Was our supply line so thin that a spike in purchasing could consume all of the gas in the city.
Finally, today the missing piece appeared. Here it is from WPLN, Nashville's NPR affiliate.
Because of poor air quality, Nashville and its surrounding counties are required by the federal government to use a special blend of fuel during the summer. It’s designed to reduce the amount of pollutants put into the air. The switch to normal gas was due to happen September 15th.
Emily LeRoy with the Tennessee Oil Marketers Association says many stations were letting their supply run down in anticipation of that date.
"There was going to be a less expensive fuel coming in, and they didn’t want to get stuck with a whole lot of the more expensive fuel."
It was a perfect storm.
- A (well-reasoned) concern about price and supply caused higher than usual purchasing.
- This happened during the last few days before the switchover to the winter blend required by EPA.
- Because the switchover was coming (specifically summer to winter when a more expensive blend is being replaced by a less expensive one) stations and suppliers had let their reserves run very low.
No rumors, no panic, no loopy southerners. Just really, really, really bad timing.
On the other hand, it has merely been inconvenient. Nothing like the horrible disaster faced by the people of east Texas.