Strike has had little impact at the pump

Associated Press

NEW YORK

Gasoline prices can spike for all kinds of reasons that make skeptical drivers roll their eyes: “tension” in the Middle East, a refinery suddenly shuts down for maintenance, or the annual springtime switch to summer blends of gasoline.

A refinery strike, however, would seem understandable. Yet three weeks into a walkout at 11 refineries around the country, the impact on the prices of gasoline, diesel and other fuels is barely discernable.

Gasoline prices have gone up this month, but mostly due to a sharp increase in the price of oil and because gas prices almost always rise at this time of year, according to Tom Kloza, chief oil analyst at the Oil Price Information Service.

If autoworkers strike, cars stop coming off the line. If teachers strike, kids don’t go to school. But refineries are different. They are like giant pressure cookers, and once they are up and running, they don’t need all that much elbow grease to keep oil flowing in and fuels coming out.

“We can continue on running with the staffing levels that we have ... for a very long period of time,” Tesoro CEO Geoff Goff told investors last week. Tesoro owns three of the refineries undergoing strikes.

The United Steelworkers union, which represents workers at 230 refineries, oil terminals, pipelines and petrochemical facilities in the U.S., called a strike Feb. 1 after failing to come to agreement over a new contract. The union accuses the refinery operators of creating unsafe conditions by tiring out union workers with extensive overtime requirements and using more and more contract workers, who they say aren’t as well-trained as USW members.

They have asked Royal Dutch Shell, which was chosen by the union to negotiate an agreement that would serve as a template for other operators, to produce information that details its use of overtime and contract work. The union expects bargaining to resume today, though a Shell spokesman would confirm only that they would try to restart negotiations sometime this week.