If americans are driving less, what do you think causes our supply of oil to shrink ?

Question

Tom Doggett of "WASHINGTON (Reuters)" wrote in his article, "Miles driven in May drop 3.7 pct: government" : "The 9.6 billion miles less traveled was the biggest drop ever for any May,....".

so we are driving less. Good! that means less oil and gas to be used. right? today (wed july 30th) the department of energy says that America's supply is "suprisingly decreased" if we are using less, how are we still losing more?

Answer 1

Oil is not only used for gasoline.  Pretty much anything that is not made of wood, stone, cloth, or metal is a derivitive of oil.

Answer 2

I think it's all a lie for the government to earn more money. The oil shortage isn't as drastic as they make it seem. But, who knows anymore? I know I have driven a hellofa lot less now that I go broke every time I go to fill my tank.

Answer 3

It's a world economy. If we don't buy the oil someone else is buying the oil. We are not losing it. We are losing by not drilling for our own.

Answer 4

Because we're one small country in a big world.  We are 5% of the world's population.  We used to use 25% of its resources because most everyone else (except Europe and Japan) was in poverty.  But India and China are both rapidly becoming first-world countries just like us.  We have 300 million people.  China has 1300 million people. India has 1100 million people. Together they are 8 TIMES our population and they all want cars and suburban homes too.  That's where the oil is going.  

What should we do?  Hate them for succeeding and starting to have what we already have?  That's silly.

Kicking the oil habit is the best thing we could do, so we're not the victims of other countries' problems.  Good luck...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/opi...

Answer 5

The Factories and business

Answer 6

because we import over 70% of our oil from other countries. with the war going on in iraq, it makes it hard for them to pump oil at full capacity. last i checked, they were only pumping about 30% of what they could (everyone's busy over there) and that oil spill in the mississippi probably doesnt help either

Answer 7

Oil is used in a lot of products other than gas... PLASTIC is one of the biggest users of oil products in the U.S.

Answer 8

because the gas companies control everything. for all we know there might not even be a shartage in gas. some guy must have gotten p****d off and decided to take it out on the rest of america

Answer 9

One word: China. They are consuming more and more everyday and they are hurting all of us.