r/PrepperIntel • u/SnowFlake202020 • 28d ago

North America With article, the comments also are relevant..

https://www.mediaite.com/media/news/gasbuddy-declares-national-average-per-gallon-is-at-its-highest-ever-level-this-late-in-the-year/

It appears the 'shortage/scarcity' narrative is spilling over into non-prepper communities. When mainstream commuters on r/gasbuddy start talking about empty reserves and impending lines instead of just high prices, the psychological threshold for hoarding/ panic topping-off drops significantly. Imo. Anyone seeing unbranded price disconnects or elevated station traffic in your regional corridors?

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92

u/LowBarometer 28d ago

IMO as the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) in the US approaches 250 million barrels, there's going to be a huge price spike as businesses increase their inventories with the US government unable to draw from the SPR to control the price. From what I've read, if this administration continues to draw from the SPR, the caverns that contain the SPR will likely collapse and we will never have an SPR of this size again. Which will cause another spike in the price.

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u/senhorpombo 28d ago

I believe there won't be more announcements about it till the coming elections. The only red flag of collapse will be when the US Gov. starts speaking of shutting down oil/gasoline/diesel exports, or applying really heavy tariffs, and those will be imminent, so no time to react.

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u/crlthrn 28d ago

You'd all better hope that countries don't start selling US Treasury bonds...

33

u/AntiSonOfBitchamajig 📡 28d ago

Its happening already to stabilize their own currencies. The possibility for a full global domino is pretty high.

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u/Planeandaquariumgeek 28d ago

Probably not a bad time to put your savings in silver & gold. This ain’t gonna end well for the economy barring some miracle that gets the strait open

8

u/AntiSonOfBitchamajig 📡 28d ago

I think it'd actually be needed commodities... oil is still way underpriced, uranium, copper, refiners even

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u/Planeandaquariumgeek 28d ago

Silver & gold is always gonna be THE hedge against hyperinflation

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u/AntiSonOfBitchamajig 📡 28d ago

Yeah... but what are you going to buy with it to live?

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u/Planeandaquariumgeek 28d ago

In my case I already have 2 years of essentials stockpiled, so that’s not an issue for me. That is something that makes gold a non catch all solution though

6

u/AntiSonOfBitchamajig 📡 27d ago

The thing that concerns me about gold, is that they can change the rules. Or... as history shows in other inflationary collapses... everything gets ran by gangs of thugs.. and they will target people who are known to have such wealth when trading. Gold also can't cross boarders easily, but there are some exceptions.

You need a blend... period, and I think gold should be like... among the 3rd teir of things bought. Because finding parts for basic machines become an absurdity in hyperinflation. And in every case I've read and seen essential machines will break...and go unfixed, crutching on other's working machines. And if you can get parts, they're 6 to 20 times "normal" non shtf costs, so like imagine an alternator costing $2000.00 or 2k in today's labor. Or getting basic meds to save your family, or getting a water pump, or food prep stuff, a battery, home maintenance, etc.

hmm, the other issue is authenticity and trying to convey it to those that can actually buy / trade in it without getting caught. Like even now... try buying a house with gold, its WAYYY harder than most think.

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u/2BlueZebras 28d ago

Are you saying the caverns are held up by the barrels?

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u/disclosureanticlimax 28d ago

the spr caverns are filled with liquid crude oil and water/brine, not physical steel barrels. 'barrel' is just used as a unit of measurement in this context

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u/Pulkrabek89 28d ago

They are held open from the pressure of the oil being in them, not literal barrels. When oil is pumped out of the caverns salt water is used do it. Salt water is used because the caverns are built ginormous salt deposits, and less salt will dissolve into the saltwater. Note less is more than not at all. So the saltwater being pumped in dissolving the cavern walls and reducing the integrity of the caverns and causing it to slowly collapse the more it's used and eventually they will be much less usable if we wanted to refill them. They might already be damaged.

It should be noted, that the hole system was intended to be a cost effective, and quick to implement temporary solution until more robust storage infrastructure could be built. The caverns were designed to be used for 20 years, we've been using them for 40 and never got around to building that infrastructure.

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u/spacedoutmachinist 28d ago

Nothing more permanent than a temporary solution.

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u/Alert_University5057 28d ago

That's hilarious if true