Is this going to be an experiment to force Californians to buy or lease electric vehicles? Consequently, their electricity prices are so high, it’s probably closing in on gasoline, and that’s only if you’re charging at home during off-peak hours. If you have to use public charging stations those are much more expensive. And they’re just forcing the refineries to close, and the refinery here in Cheyenne, WY already converted over to bio-diesel that is shipped to California. It would be kind of funny if California depends on refineries in red states with less regulations then shipped in with costs absorbed by residents in California. There are limits to rail capacity as well, which could lead to higher shipping rates.
https://issuesinsights.com/2025/04/29/newsom-hits-the-gas/
By I & I Editorial Board
It wasn’t long ago that a California governor made it clear that oil refineries were not welcome in his state. Then another California governor asked regulators to loosen the chains on refineries to ensure that they will be profitable and remain in the state that every day burns an enormous volume of gasoline.
Actually, it is the same governor, one who has turned his attention from playing to his hard-left, blue-state constituency to shifting toward the middle for a 2028 White House run.
It was just last summer when Gov. Gavin Newsom announced a “plan to prevent Big Oil ‘profit spikes’” that would also “save Californians money at the pump.” He groused about refiners “playing games to earn even more profits” and vowed to force them to “act responsibly.”
Two months later, he signed a bill that is intended to limit “higher profits for the industry.” Within hours, Phillips 66 said that it was closing its Los Angeles refinery complex.
“Without actually using the words, the company is saying there’s no reason to stick around and be abused,” the Pacific Research Institute said last fall.
Then, earlier this year, PRI pointed out that “California is literally running out of oil refineries.”
“Phillips 66 announced it was closing its Los Angeles refinery complex in 2025. It will be the fourth refinery shut down in the state since 2020. At that point, there will be only a dozen refineries left to produce the 38 million gallons of California’s boutique blend – which is not made anywhere else, costs more than conventional gasoline, and requires oil companies to invest billions to upgrade their systems to make – that’s consumed daily.”
Or it could be only 14. Valero is likely to close its California refinery next year.
Mission accomplished. Then the mission changed. Now, Newsom is asking regulators to do what they can to keep oil refineries open.
In a letter to California Energy Commission Vice Chairman Siva Gunda, sent days after Valero’s announcement, the governor asked the agency to “redouble the state’s efforts to work closely with refiners,” and to ensure that “refiners continue to see the value in serving the California market, even as demand for fossil fuels continues its gradual decline over the coming decades.”
During an earnings call last week, Valero CEO Lane Riggs said “California has been pursuing policies to move away from fossil fuels for the past 20 years, and the consequence of that is the regulatory and enforcement environment is the most stringent and difficult of anywhere else in North America.”
Seems California voters who have given nearly unchecked power to Democrats for about two decades are getting it good and hard. Newsom is trying to unwind some of the damage, primarily because he’s lusting after the White House, but the briar patch of regulations will make it a difficult task.
There’s a practical aspect, as well, to Newsom’s shift: A California without oil refineries is a severely wounded state. The prices of refined crude products would rise, jobs would be lost (nearly 9,000 are directly employed at the state’s refineries) and tax revenue (at 68 cents a gallon, the state has the highest gasoline tax in the nation) would fall.
We would see logistical problems, too, since the 38 million gallons of California’s boutique blend that’s consumed daily can’t be shipped in like bottled water from Fiji. “California effectively is an ‘oil island,’ with no pipelines linking the state to other crude oil production and refining regions,” says the Western States Petroleum Association.
The state could take over the facilities, and, in fact, this has been discussed. But it wouldn’t be a solution, since state control of the refineries might not be all that different from having no refineries at all.
Newsom recently bragged that California is now the fourth-largest economy in the world. That’s nice, but it won’t last long if Sacramento’s political war on oil and gas continues.
— Written by the I&I Editorial Board