California is falling into an unrecoverable deficit of refineries

California can't pipe in refined fuel overland the way most states can; it's cut off, hence "Energy Island." Add the recent closures of Phillips 66 Los Angeles and Valero Benicia and more imminent closures, and CARB's tightening emissions standards squeezing the refiners that remain and Californian's have the highest transportation fuel prices in the country.

So, who actually fills the transportation fuels gap?

As in-state refining capacity shrinks, California increasingly imports transportation fuels from Asia. Those refineries aren't accountable to CARB. They have no equivalent emissions, environmental and labor standards; anything goes in those countries to extract, refine and sell oil they get out of the ground. By CARB's own definitions, all these countries would qualify as "gross polluters" if it were done in-state. This is a consequence of cutting off our own ability to produce petroleum at home. It is the textbook definition of "leakage" on a scale of mass proportions.

Then there's the shipping angle as the fuel crosses the Pacific on high-emission tankers, voyages as long as 45 days. This is a global emissions cost California's policy simply exports rather than eliminates. However, three of the busiest ports at Long Beach, Los Angeles, and Oakland are not designed for all the tankage required to accept and store 58 million gallons a day of imported transportation fuels from foreign refineries.

Tie the fuel-import dependency directly to the assets that run on it: military installations, international airports, major shipping ports. Relying on foreign-refined fuel - particularly refined in and shipped from Asia - for the fuel that powers military and port logistics is a national security exposure, not merely a pocketbook issue.

· While California has closed 2 refineries with the 7 remaining at risk of closing, approximately 181 new oil refinery projects are planned or announced to commence operations in Africa, Asia, and the Middle East between 2024 and 2030, with Africa leading with roughly 70–89 projects, Asia follows, with a strong focus on expansion (e.g., in India and China). The Middle East is adding significant capacity (approx. 30–81 projects), with major projects in Iran and Iraq.

• The rest of the world is moving decisively in the opposite direction of California as they recognize that their economies are totally dependent on the products and transportation fuels MADE FROM raw crude oil, the same products and transportation fuels that unreliable electricity generated from Wind and Solar CANNOT make!
• Note the Brownsville, Texas refinery point: new domestic capacity elsewhere doesn't solve California's transportation fuels supply chain problems because the state's fuel specs and Energy Island logistics keep it walled off even from other U.S. refiners.

Here's the irony: policymakers believe closing California refineries that utilize approximately 500 acres each, reduces worldwide emissions, but they're actually increasing the emissions overseas to less-regulated refineries and dirtier tankers all the while adding transit emissions that wouldn't exist if the fuel were refined at home. And we have a lot of crude oil reserves under our feet in the Monterey Shale that in-state refineries need.

Policymakers need to treat in-state refining and production capacity to meet the daily demands for the products and 58 million gallons of transportation fuels demanded daily that are made from the raw crude oil refined at refineries as core infrastructure and a national security asset, not as hobby horse and liability to be regulated away.