(Update: We’ve created a better version of this here.)
Look how much we’re spending on oil and gas in the Northwest states:
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If you have javascript enabled on your computer, you should be seeing the year-to-date totals rack up, at a pretty astonishing rate—about $19.2 billion per year.
Of course, the counter above assumes that energy spending patterns will be the same in 2007 as in 2006. So far, that doesn’t look too far off the mark.
The detailed breakdown:
- The Northwest’s energy spending set a new single-year record in 2006. Adjusting for inflation, the $19.2 billion we spent to import petroleum and natural gas last year was up 13 percent over 2005—which was itself a record.
- Oil and gas import spending totalled $10.9 billion in Washington; $6.1 billion in Oregon; and $2.2 billion in Idaho.
- We spent about $14.8 billion on oil, and $4.4 billion on natural gas.
- Per capita spending in the region averaged $1,660. (Just to be clear, that includes spending by industry, government, and businesses, as well as household and personal spending.)
- Adjusted for inflation, per capita spending was nearly as high as it was at height of the last big price spike, in the early 1980s.
And a final note: these figures don’t include taxes, refining, marketing, and so on. It’s just the cost of the raw commodities—that is the amount that refineries pay to have crude oil delivered to them, and that utilities and other big gas users pay at the “city gate” for natural gas.
Alan Durning
Wow, that’s $53 million a day! How does that compare to gross regional product? In past years, it’s been about 3 percent. What about now?
Matt the Engineer
Powerful numbers. I wonder if people would consider electric cars, improved wall insulation, and buying local food if they realized they pay about $125,000 over their lifetime to this (again, adding taxes etc. we’d have to bump this up quite a bit).
Jan
Okay, how about adding BC to the list?
sf
OK, so energy prices are going up. We knew that. The question is, are we reducing our per/capita consumption of energy as a result of these high prices?
sf
http://www.sightline.org/maps/charts/ener_enerusest_cs06/?searchterm=None Your graph here shows a slight decline since 1999. I wonder what the current prices are doing to our consumption.
Clark Williams-Derry
Jan -I’m working on that! BC data is a little harder to deal with, since a) the province produces a fair amount of oil & gas, which (if I want to be consistent) I have to back out of consumption; and b) US energy data is free, up to date, easy to download, and I’m more familiar with it. But I’ll try to get to BC soon, or soon-ish.sf -Wishy-washy answer: sorta, though nowhere near as much as I might have thought. Gasoline consumption is definitely down, measured per capita. But diesel is up, while electricity in homes and businesses is up over the past few years. (Industrial electriciy usage fluctuates with the aluminum market.) Natural gas trends (and to some extent electricity) are inherently variable because of weather; and residential & commercial consumption has gone up somewhat just because most new homes use gas heat rather than electric. So it’s hard to tell there what the effect of pricing might be—not impossible, but also not something I’ve got time to do…