To anyone who received an email urging them to boycott various oil companies (the list seems to change):

The problem with the price of gas is not that it is too high. The problem is that it is much too low.

“Since we all rely on our cars, we can’t just stop buying gas.”

For those of us who live outside large urban centers, this is probably true. But most of us drive cars that are bigger, more powerful, and “sportier” than anything we actually need. Making a responsible car choice would reduce the average drivers’ gasoline costs by half. We also drive more than we need to. By car-pooling, planning our errands in such a way as to require fewer trips, and using public transportation when possible, most of us could cut our transportation budget in half.

Responsible global citizenship requires that we take these steps, to protect a dwindling resource and combat global warming. The fact that so few people are willing, proves that gasoline is still much too cheap.

For the brilliant mathematician, who distributed the original article to “three hundred million people”:

Currently we are exploiting fossil fuels on the premise that the “profits” generated belong to whoever has the means and access to extract raw material and refine it into fuel. But since fossil fuels are non-renewable, this constitutes a form of theft. Explain to your children why they should have to pay ten times more than you did, not only for fuel, but anything that requires fuel in its production and distribution (especially food!). Is this fair and reasonable, simply because we got to the resource first?

Direct costs associated with a rise in the price of oil pale in comparison with the astronomical costs associated with global warming. This burden too is to be borne by future generations, who did not have the benefit of burning the fuel that released the CO2 that caused the warming in the first place.

We live in an age where the continued flow of oil is so vital to our industrialized existence, that we are willing to instigate wars to ensure its continued flow. To date the most recent Iraq war has cost the American taxpayer 280 billion dollars. This too is part of the hidden cost of gasoline. Anyone care to do the math?

This still ignores human cost - one hundred thousand Iraqi civilians and counting.

If the true costs of burning gasoline were factored into its price, a litre would probably fall somewhere between $10 and $100. The reason we can have it for the bargain price of $1.18 is that we are

a) essentially stealing it, and
b) not required to clean up the mess we are making

According to the email I recieved, the fabulous idea to boycott certain oil companies came from a former Halliburton engineer. Ironic if true, considering that Halliburton, a major Republican contributor has profited by hundreds of millions of dollars from the war.

Actually there are plenty of reasons to boycott at least two of the three companies on the list. While I can’t speak for Petro Canada, we do know Shell and Exxon to be two of the worst corporate citizens of all time.

Shell collaborated with a military dictatorship that brutally quashed opposition to environmental destruction, by Shell, in the Nigerian river delta.

Exxon officials have steadfastly maintained that the pursuit of clean energy runs counter to the companies interests.

Sadly there has never been massive public outrage, and consumers have continued to buy from both companies. If these same consumers should now turn against Shell and Exxon for the prospect of saving a few cents at the pump, we will know definitively, that our society is beyond saving.

Respectfully,

Michael Hey

P.S. Your investment strategy seems sound enough. But if you are looking to profit from rising energy costs, why not invest that money in companies that are striving towards a clean alternative?