Trump to the rescue for California drivers — despite Gavin Newsom

Gavin Newsom and the state Legislature are trying everything they can to increase the cost of gas at the pump for Californians. 

Raising taxes and forcing the closure of refineries are their tools to punish drivers who are just trying to get to work or to the grocery store. 

Now the Trump administration has stepped in to provide some relief to Californians and their wallets.

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin has announced that starting on Sept. 1, hand-in-hand with the Department of Energy (DOE), he will issue a temporary emergency waiver of the Clean Air Act (CAA). The waiver will allow what is known as E10 to be blended differently.

E10 is gasoline blended with 10% ethanol. The EPA’s waiver will allow E10 to be blended at a higher Reid Vapor Pressure (RVP), meaning that the process will use less gasoline. The effect will be to increase the gasoline supply and lower gasoline prices.

Ethanol is in common use across America. Many people are not aware there are two different blends, a summer and winter blend. The summer blend burns faster, using more fuel. This waiver issued by the EPA will allow for an earlier conversion to the winter blend — again, saving gas.

Normally, the summer blend ends on Sept. 15 for most of the country. Not in California, where the summer blend (without the waiver) has to be produced for much longer, only ending on Oct. 31. 

The EPA’s new waiver could mean that Californians will have additional two months of a form of gasoline that lasts far longer in their gas tank and costs less to produce.  

We know that the environmental lobby will howl at this change; it opposes almost everything the Trump administration does. But the waiver appears to have been reviewed properly by the EPA and DOE, according to powers of discretion that were written into law by Congress.  

Until now, California officials have also done everything they can to resist efforts by the Trump administration to increase fuel supplies and lower prices. They are fighting his effort to develop offshore oil and gas production, for example. Notably, these same officials ignored President Joe Biden’s attempts to lower gas prices with interventions that were actually damaging to the country’s long-term interests, such as draining the strategic petroleum reserves. If Trump does it, it must be wrong, even if it helps California drivers and the California economy generally.

Here’s the thing: California is running out of alternatives. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright made the point that the Trump administration’s strategy is focused on increasing the available supply of gasoline. Gov. Newsom has done the opposite during his two terms in office. Three oil refineries closed in California during the first six years of Newsom’s tenure. Two more are scheduled to close, which currently account for 18% of the state’s refining capacity. 

Those closures will limit the positive impact in California of what Zeldin and Wright are doing. So will the fact that California blends most of its gasoline within its own borders, because it has imposed stricter environmental requirements on fuel. So any changes to the national blend will have fewer benefits for the Golden State.

Meanwhile, California has become a cartoon image of America in the 1970s — totally dependent on shipments of oil from the Middle East, as if half a century of diversification and domestic production had never happened.

While the state is fighting the oil industry, and Trump on all fronts, California drivers are suffering at the pump. At least the Trump administration is making an effort to help Californians, even if their elected officials and bureaucrats don’t seem to care.  

Bruce Bialosky, a former presidential appointee, is a certified public accountant specializing in taxes.  

Download The California Post App, follow us on social, and subscribe to our newsletters