PiSigma
"the engineer"
US is not independent on oil. US produce a ton of light oil from shale, but not much heavy which is mostly imported from Canada Mexico and Venezuela (now replaced by Saudi). US is net-i dependent, means it exports oil in general.I'm watching Trump's daily coronavirus update and a journalist ask him about the US putting tariffs on foreign oil. Trump says the US is energy independent so it doesn't need foreign oil but he's going to impose a tariff to protect US energy companies. So what's the point of the tariff if the US doesn't need foreign oil. Is China paying the tariff? It might cause a fake emotional rise in the price of oil but if the US isn't buying foreign oil, The US tariff doesn't costs anybody else. What does he think is going to happen? It'll increase the price of oil so US oil companies can make more money because oil is traded and priced by the world market?
This is an example how the US threat to manufacture everything at home will in fact due more harm to the US. The US has little influence with Saudi Arabia and Russia on their conflict which results in low oil prices. Don't buy foreign oil and now China is the biggest importer. So which country is going to be accommodated more by oil producing states? The US that buys zip from them or China that buys more? And then at home protecting US energy producers means keeping oil prices high. They would have to break away from the world oil trade to make oil prices higher than the world market. Who's going to buy oil that costs more? Only American consumers that have no other choice. China can buy oil from countries the US doesn't want anyone to business with? How are they going to punish China for doing that? They stopped importing from China because everything is Made in America now because they don't want their money going to China. The only leverage they have left is to go to war with China. All because China is buying general things from countries Americans don't like?
Heavy oil is needed to make diesel, kerosene, bunker fuels etc. Light is only used for some gasoline blends and butane, propanes.