In the colony’s pipeline chaos, the tanker began to rescue

On Wednesday night, The Colonial Pipeline Company, which operates the country’s largest product pipeline system, reported that the 5,500-mile-long system has finally restarted and started operations, and service is expected to return to normal by the end of this week.Since the pipeline has been Historical–Ransomware attack.

However, as of Thursday morning, cars continued to wind around the upper and lower gas stations in the eastern coastal area, waiting for their turn to refuel. It turns out that if you tell people that something is threatening their oil supply, they will scare away and buy a lot of oil. The National Convenience Stores Association reported on Wednesday that the business volume at gas stations is twice to four times as high as usual, and some retailers have removed natural gas for a few days within a few hours, each filling station about 16,000 gallons. Jeff Lenard, vice president of strategic industry planning for the association, said this is a buying behavior that the industry usually sees around hurricanes.

Panic buying has spread to areas that don’t even get natural gas from colonial pipelines: the association reported on Wednesday that sales to the south as far as Naples, Florida, have increased, and the area has taken gasoline from ships.

Industry executives said that the pipeline shutdown did cause some supply problems. However, because the oil is simply in the wrong place, many natural gas shortages in retail locations are occurring. In the past few days, the oil and gas industry has generally been unable to use pipelines, so it has switched to other modes of transportation: railways, ships, and most importantly, tankers.Many tankers truck.

Usually, tanker trucks are the last element in the long journey of oil from the refinery to the tank. Ships, railroads, and pipelines did most of the work, transporting natural gas to distribution terminals scattered across the country. The truck completed the journey from the distribution station to one of the country’s 150,000 gas stations. Ryan Streblow, interim president of the National Tanker Transportation Company, said that due to the slowdown of pipelines and the increase in demand everywhere, truck drivers now have to turn around faster, sometimes even longer trips- Up to 80 to 180 miles more each time. , An industry group.

However, there are only so many trucks that can keep up, and there are only so many drivers. According to the National Tanker Truck Transport Company, thousands of oil drivers were on the road this week, each carrying 8,000 to 11,500 gallons of gasoline. It may take several days for all pump equipment to return to normal.

In order to make the transportation of natural gas faster, the federal government has approved exemptions for specific areas that allow fuel trucks to transport more gasoline than is normally allowed by safety guidelines. It also cancelled some service time rules, allowing drivers to stay on the road longer than usual.

Michael Belzer, an economist at Wayne State University, used truck research as an object and compared the situation in the oil and gas industry to Types of supply chain problems During this period, many other departments are also facing Coronavirus disease Pandemic-from toilet paper to milk to wood. He said: “Like everyone else in the Covid economy, you will have a supply chain chaos.” This means that the product is not where it is needed. “It will take time to catch up with the small increase in demand.”

Petroleum industry executives say that if there are more tanker truck drivers, it will be easier to get gasoline to the right place. In April, the Petroleum Transportation Industry Group Began to warn drivers of shortages, Especially in the busy summer season, the demand for natural gas is expected to rise. Streblow said on Wednesday that the number of drivers in the industry has decreased by 10% compared to 2019. “When your supply chain is interrupted, you will face greater challenges, and this is what we are facing now on the East Coast. Therefore, it is more stressful.”