Skinner: Gasoline reserves can save us all money at the pump

For millennia, farmers throughout the world have stored excess grains during harvest season to ensure there’s enough food year-round. Likewise, for more than a century, California has stored water in winter so we don’t run out during the dry summer months.

But there’s one major commodity that California has never required to be maintained in adequate supply, even though it remains essential to our economy: gasoline.

Because we have no gasoline reserves, California routinely suffers fuel shortages, especially during peak travel times, such as Labor Day or Thanksgiving or when one or more of our major oil refineries shuts down for maintenance.

These fuel shortages, in turn, cause price hikes at the pump. Sometimes prices can spike 50 cents a gallon or more in a very short period, burdening our already stretched household budgets.

That’s why the Legislature should pass Gov. Gavin Newsom’s commonsense proposal to require oil refineries to maintain sufficient reserves of gasoline so that California can avoid future shortages and the price spikes they cause. The proposal, AB X 2-1, is now in the state Assembly during a special legislative session.

For the full op-ed, click here.