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Weather: Sunny, with a high near 79. Northeast wind 9 to 14 mph, with gusts as high as 20 mph. Friday Night: Mostly clear, with a low around 65. East wind 5 to 8 mph, with gusts as high as 15 mph.
- Daily weather briefing from the National Weather Service in Jacksonville here.
- Drought conditions here. (What is the Keetch-Byram drought index?).
- Check today’s tides in Daytona Beach (a few minutes off from Flagler Beach) here.
- Tropical cyclone activity here, and even more details here.
Today at a Glance:
Free For All Fridays with Host David Ayres, an hour-long public affairs radio show featuring local newsmakers, personalities, public health updates and the occasional surprise guest, starts a little after 9 a.m. after FlaglerLive Editor Pierre Tristam’s Reality Check. Today’s guests: Catherine Eastman of Whitney Lab’s turtle hospital and all about Taste of the Fun Coast’s fundraiser for it next week. See previous podcasts here. On WNZF at 94.9 FM, 1550 AM, and live at Flagler Broadcasting’s YouTube channel.
The Flagler County Cultural Council (FC3) meets at 11 a.m. at the Tourism Development Office, 120 Airport Road, Palm Coast, in the 3rd-floor conference room. The meetings are open to the public. Contact [email protected] for additional information. See: “Over Mayor’s Objections, Palm Coast Signals It’ll Extend Agreement with Cultural Council to Manage $100,000 in Grants,” and “How Peter Johnson’s ‘Bullshit’ Trespass Led to Sunshine on FC3 Cultural Board and Its Accountability to Palm Coast.”
The Friday Blue Forum, a discussion group organized by local Democrats, meets at 12:15 p.m. at the Flagler Democratic Office at 160 Cypress Point Parkway, Suite C214 (above Cue Note) at City Marketplace. Come and add your voice to local, state and national political issues.
Clay Jones Update: Here are a few excerpts from the update Clay send on Oct. 16: “I recently transferred to the rehab center, which is just across the street from the hospital. Today I took a cognitive test, I took a speech pattern test, and I took a physical test. Every day from here on out, I will be taking a physical test, which we call PT. They usually wanna work people till they wanna quit, but they haven’t had that problem with me yet, not because I’m super amazing or awesome, but because I really want to beat this shit as quickly as I can. My friend Melissa Colombo came by and brought me some clothes. Nobody can go on Facebook and ask people to bring them shorts, T-shirts, and underwear while they’re in a rehab center, but I can. Hell, I once got people to send me self-addressed stamped envelopes for messed-up business cards. But I sent out a request on Facebook for someone to bring me some shorts and T-shirts to the rehab center. All I had this morning was just a road in the hospital, and my ass was hanging out. […] The next 10 days are going to be more PT. I am expected to be in this place for at least 10 days. After that, I’m expected to go home. The thing is, I live in a second-level apartment, and I want to be able to walk into my apartment and take care of myself again. Unfortunately, I’m nowhere close to that yet. Walking, taking steps, things are extremely difficult right now, and even grabbing things is impossible, but I am further today than I was yesterday. If you have donated to me either by becoming a paid subscriber to my Substack, or donated through PayPal, or donated through Venmo (clay-jones-87), or donated through Zelle, and I have not sent you a message, please accept my apologies. I want to thank everybody who has supported me through this. The outpouring of support has blown me away. In fact, it’s blown away the entire cartooning community. We are all very impressed and overwhelmed by your support, especially me. I just wanna say thank you. I’m never going to stop saying thank you. And on that note, I was just visited by a former photographer from the Free Lance-Star, Suzanne Carr Rossi. She brought me pants. […] Remember when Donald Trump took that cognitive test and bragged about it? Remember that he had to repeat “person, woman, man, camera, TV”. Trump said. “They said nobody gets it in order, it’s actually not that easy. But for me it was easy. And that’s not an easy question.” He is right. It’s not an easy question when you have to answer five minutes later. It’s not easy when the question is “bridge, Sarah, justice, banana.” It’s not easy when you have to remember photos that include car keys, a comb, and a helicopter five minutes later. […] It’s not easy to have to draw a clock and other shapes with your left hand when you’re handed and your right hand is kind of dead from a stroke. It’s not easy to do any of the stuff after having a stroke, but I did it. The thing is, nobody told me I was great or amazing for it. Sicophants didn’t fawn over me for it. Nobody threw a parade for me because I remembered five words. Idiots didn’t go until late-night TV to tell me I was a genius for it. Donald Trump wants you to treat him like a baby for remembering five words. Donald Trump never suffered from a stroke. So why was Donald Trump given this cognitive test? Who knew that my stroke would become part of my research?”
Clay, as we can see, is still very much Clay.
—P.T.
The Live Calendar is a compendium of local and regional political, civic and cultural events. You can input your own calendar events directly onto the site as you wish them to appear (pending approval of course). To include your event in the Live Calendar, please fill out this form.
October 2025
Free For All Fridays With Host David Ayres on WNZF
Flagler County Cultural Council (FC3) Meeting
Friday Blue Forum
Flagler Beach Farmers Market
Coffee With Flagler Beach Commission Chair Scott Spradley
Democratic Women’s Club
Grace Community Food Pantry on Education Way
No Kings Rallies in Palm Coast and Flagler Beach
City Repertory Theatre Retrospective Concert
Random Acts of Insanity’s Roundup of Standups from Around Central Florida
For the full calendar, go here.
Ours is the first age in history which has asked the child what he would tolerate learning, but that is a part of the problem with which I am not equipped to deal. The devil of Educationism that possesses us is the kind that can be cast out only by prayer and fasting. No one has yet come along strong enough to do it. In other ages the attention of children was held by Homer and Virgil, among others, but by the reverse evolutionary process, that is no longer possible; our children are too stupid now to enter the past imaginatively. No one asks the student if algebra pleases him or if he finds it satisfactory that some French verbs are irregular, but if he prefers Hersey to Hawthorne, his taste must prevail.
–From Flannery O’Connor’s “Fiction Is a Subject with a History” (1963).
Dennis C Rathsam says
Flagler Live, seems to ignor all the great things TRUMP has done in such a short time! They’d rather print stupit cartoons, to show thier ignorance, and anti American values. TRUMP has brought peace to the Middle East after years of war! But no Pierre continues his hatered of TRUMP, even though he stopped the blood shead in Pierre,s home land. As TRUMP makes this a country a better place to live for all Americans…. Economy is doing well, major Democrat cities are being cleaned up from the crime that’s been haunting them for yrs! The Jackass party fights him in these cities, but the people who live in them REJOYCE! they are happy to have some sanity once again. Maybe Pierre, with all your knowledge, you should return to your homeland, & be part of the rebuilding team, you could be a valuable cog in the future of Palistine.
Pogo says
@P.T.
Where are you being held; don’t worry — your impersonator is jolly good, he is.
Mr. Jones, God bless ya sir.
Ray W. says
Hello Mr. Tristam. Thank you, both for the Flannery O’Connor observation that American children had become uneducable at the time of her writing and for the health update about Clay Jones. I wish ignorance or ill health on no one. As Winston Churchill is said to have quipped: Happiness is good health and a short memory.
Educability as a theory centers in no small part on the idea of a person’s capacity to believe that another person can speak, know and understand the truth about a subject matter, any subject matter. If one voluntarily chooses to not believe that he or she can learn from a Democrat, by definition, that means that the person has purposely rendered himself or herself uneducable, i.e., that he or she has surrendered the human capacity to learn from others. Of course, the political reverse is true. Democrats can voluntarily choose to surrender the capacity to learn, too.
One of the issues so common among the uneducable among us is a belief that coal, the most expensive of all options of electricity generation, will make America great again.
The Trump administration’s take on this issue has not yet been to build brand-new coal-fired power plants. Rather, the issue thus far is an agency head issuing administrative orders extending the certified lifespan of aging coal-fired power plants scheduled for closure, regardless of the additional costs that coal-fired electricity generation creates, additional costs that are passed to the consumer.
I have been reading for some time about molten salt heat storage, often referred to as molten salt battery storage.
I came across an interesting study out of Chile. The government funded a study of whether an aging coal-fired power plant could be adapted to the use of a rock-based “heat” battery storage system.
In the study, the coal-firing part of the aging Chilean power plant was removed. A rock-based “heat” battery provided the energy necessary to continue to run the boiler and an associated steam turbine.
Basically, a large bed of rocks was placed in an insulated container and then immersed in water. During the day, solar power was used to heat the water and rocks to up to 650 degrees Centigrade, a temperature high enough to efficiently run the steam turbine.
It turns out that the energy stored in the “heat” battery was enough to run the boiler and steam turbine for eight hours at a time at a cost comparable to the expense of coal, but only if the coal-fired plant is a “state of the art” plant. If I am reading the story correctly, that means that older coal-fired boilers that are less efficient than “state of the art” coal-fired boilers would cost more to operate than does the “heat” battery.
On the same subject, Interesting Engineering recently published an article about a “heat” battery based on bricks, not rocks.
According to the reporter, a company called Rondo Energy, based in the San Francisco area, just launched its form of a “heat” battery that is located adjacent to the Holmes Western Oil facility. Bricks stacked in a container and covered with water are heated from power generated entirely by an onsite solar array. The Holmes Western Oil facility extracts oil from the ground by injecting steam into the ground, which steam process aids crude oil extraction. The company had been using a gas-powered boiler to provide a steady and long-term level of steam.
In this application, the gas-fired boiler still operates, but not necessarily around the clock. The “heat” battery is heated to 1,000 degrees C (1,832 degrees F) from solar power during the day and, right now, is operated for eight hours at a time. During a 10-week trial process, the stored heat energy provided the necessary steam at a steady temperature. The “heat” battery “achieved a more than 97 percent efficiency while maintaining temperatures above 1,000 degrees C. …” It also delivered steam at pressures above 100 bar (1,450 psi).
According to Rondo Energy’s CEO, “[t]he Rondo Heat Battery is now proven at industrial scale.”
He added: “We’re already developing and operating heat batteries across four continents and five industries. Our customers are improving their competitiveness and slashing their carbon emissions at the same time.”
The reporter wrote that one of the advantages of Rondo’s “heat battery” was that solar energy costs remain stable over time, as opposed to natural gas costs, which fluctuate daily. And, companies that operate cement kilns or chemical plants need “steady, high-temperature heat”, something that a “heat” battery can provide.
Said Andy Lubershane, partner at Energy Impact Partners:
“Just as electric vehicles opened up transport to renewable power, heat batteries will open up the industrial heat market. … It’s another global inflection point for solar and wind.”
The reporter concluded:
“Unlike heat pumps or electric boilers that require constant electricity, the new system only needs to be charged for about six hours each day using the cheapest available energy, such as from off-grid solar or low-cost grid power. Once charged, it can supply heat continuously.”
Make of this what you will.
Me?
I remember a story about a German zinc-plating plant. Russian had just invaded the Ukraine. All of a sudden, Russian natural gas became volatile. Would there be sanctions. Would Russia cut off its exports of natural gas.
The company’s molten zinc vat had to be maintained above a certain temperature to plate zinc onto objects immersed in the vat.
As an aside, I suppose every FlaglerLive reader has heard of zinc plating.
If the temperature of the zinc in the vat fell below that minimum temperature, the entire quantity of zinc in the vat would lost, because the process of heating zinc occurred before the zinc was introduced into the vat. The vat itself could be maintained at a temperature above the minimum, but solidified zinc in the vat couldn’t be reheated if the temperature dropped below the minimum. The issue wasn’t whether the cost of the natural gas rose due to sanctions or due to an embargo; the issue was whether natural gas supplies actually ran out. If the plant owner couldn’t obtain natural gas, the plating plant would lose all of the zinc in the vat. Sometimes, industry just needs a steady supply of heat.
Let’s face it. It is politically important that people believe that the energy industry is simple. Just open up access to coal on federal land and America will become great again. But the reality is that it is economically important to understand that the international energy marketplace is both vast in scope and incredibly complex.
There is, however, one constant in the international energy marketplace. Of the many available forms of energy out there, the marketplace always takes the path of most efficiency, unless government places its thumb on the scales. This is why existing energy industries all over the world lobby governments to protect their existing interests. Thumbs on scales are the energy lobbyists stock in trade.
Anyone who argues that the German zinc-plating plant owner would choose to continue to rely on natural gas to provide steady heat, with all the vagaries in both price and availability that natural gas offers, over a cheaper, more stable, and local source of energy necessary to maintain the temperature of the zinc in the vat, is a fool.
I am not arguing that a “heat” battery would answer that companies needs, because I haven’t come across an article showing that a “heat” battery can offer reliable heat at a temperature high enough to keep the zinc liquid.
Thus far, I have come across one article about a utility process that requires steady 650 degree C heat and another article about an industrial process that requires a steady 1,000 degree C heat. I have yet to find a study about “heat” batteries providing the steady energy needed to maintain zinc plating vat temperatures.
But I looked up the melting temperature of zinc: 419.5 degrees C. It seems to me that a heat battery based on a pile of bricks located in an insulated container filled with water should be relatively maintenance-free. A solar array constructed adjacent to or near the zinc plating plant that provides enough power over a six hour cycle to raise the heat level inside the “heat” battery high enough to provide steady heat at a level above 419.5 degrees C 24 hours a day seems feasible.
There are hundreds of closed coal-fired power plants dotted all across America. They were closed because coal costs too much. American’s prefer lower electricity bills over higher electricity bills. Many of these closed power plants are still connected to the grid.
One current solution has been to tear down entire closed coal-fired power plants and build solar farms on the cleared grounds, hooking the solar arrays directly into the already existing grid connections.
But solar arrays do not provide power 24 hours a day. This is a valid point. Battery facilities that store the solar power can bridge the off-hours, but chemical battery packs remain somewhat expensive, even though the price of these types of batteries is dropping rapidly.
The Chilean study and the American article on which I rely suggest there is another way.
Remove the coal-firing part of the power plant and build a “heat” battery container in its place. A “heat” battery can provide the steam necessary to run the boilers 24 hours a day. Bricks and water are cheap.
Then, build a solar farm adjacent to the “heat” battery, but make the array just large enough use to heat the bricks and water, with a little to spare. The overall cost could be less than what it would cost to level the entire plant. Once operational, no coal need ever be bought throughout the lifetime of the renewed plant. Sunlight is free. Whatever maintenance cost is left to keep the panels clean and keep the boilers and steam turbine operating would be minimal compared to keeping an aging coal-fired plant operational.
Of course, if the entire piping infrastructure from the aging coal-fired plant has to be replaced, due to metal fatigue, then that might be another story.
Ray W. says
This, at least to me, is an important development.
President Trump recently met with India’s Prime Minister Modhi.
According to a New Voice of Ukraine story, on October 15th, President Trump announced that Prime Minister Modhi has promised that India would stop buying sanctioned Russian oil. The Indian government has not yet confirmed the validity of Trump’s announcement.
From April to September, the first six months of the Indian government’s fiscal year, India purchased, on average, 1.75 million barrels of crude oil per day from Russia. India, at the same time, purchased, on average, 213,000 barrels of crude oil per day from the U.S.
So do I find important in the news today?
Two different Indian refinery owners, Indian Oil Corp and Hindustan Petroleum Corp, just agreed, for the first time, to buy two million barrels of crude oil each from South American suppliers.
According to the reporter, who did not identify the source of the report from which the following quote was sourced:
“India is diversifying its crude supplies by trying out new grades from South America where production is growing. … Adding more crude sources would also help refiners to replace some imports of Russian oil. The U.S. is pressuring New Delhi to stop buying Russian crude to help in the war in Ukraine.”
According to the reporter, Guyana just added a “fourth floating production unit”, and that Guyana’s overall crude oil production just hit 938,000 barrels per day.
Make of this what you will.
Me?
Four million barrels of oil from South America is not much when India is purchasing 1.75 million barrels of oil per day from Russia. But it is a start. Market share, once lost, cannot easily be regained. If the South American oil is of a good quality for the two Indian refineries, then additional purchases might be made.
I have repeatedly posted comments about Guyana’s growing crude oil production figures. The amount of Guyana’s proven oil reserves is sufficiently large for Venezuela to not only claim that the oil field belongs to Venezuela, but also to threaten war to recover the region. Two American energy companies own a majority interest in the deep-water Guyanese offshore drilling platform from which extracted oil is loaded directly onto supertankers. I suspect but cannot prove that the current American military presence near Venezuela is more to deter Venezuelan aggression against Guyana than it is to deter drug trafficking by blowing up boats.
As an aside, an oil exploration company recently confirmed the existence of a huge accessible deep-water crude oil deposit off the coast of Argentina. That, too, might offer a tiny part of an overall explanation of why a $20 billion currency swap was offered the Argentina’s President Milei, with the caveat set by President Trump that the currency swap will not occur unless the Argentine electorate votes Milei’s party into power in the country’s October mid-term elections. Not all legislative seats are up for election. But Milei’s La Libertad Avanza party holds a significant minority in each house of the Argentine legislature.
According to Time, La Libertad Avanza holds six of 72 Senate seats and at least 127 of 257 Chamber of Deputies seats. A number of news outlets report that Milei’s party will likely struggle in the upcoming elections.
Pierre Tristam says
Dennis, Gaza and Israel are not my homelands, thank heavens. Based on the Department of Homeland Security’s surveillance pings, my homeland is Palm Coast’s P-Section. Before that, it was Lakeland. Before that, it was Beckley, West Virginia. before that, it was Chapel Hill, N.C. Before that, it was New York City. Before that, it was Canterbury, England. Before that, it was Beirut and a small village in the mountains of Lebanon you’ve never heard of (not that American geography would ring a bell with you, as few things other than your sycophantic bellhopping for our moron-in-chief do).
Ray W. says
In recent months, I have taken to commenting on each of the Fed’s new “Beige Books” that come out eight times a year.
The October Beige Book came out two days ago.
Under the National Summary are three categories of economic findings.
1. Overall Economic Activity:
“Economic activity changed little on balance since the previous report, with three Districts reporting slight to modest growth in activity, five reporting no change, and four noting a slight softening. Overall consumer spending, particularly on retail goods, inched down in recent weeks, although auto sales were boosted in some Districts by strong demand for electric vehicles ahead of the expiration of a federal tax credit at the end of September. Demand for leisure and hospitality services by international travelers fell further over the reporting period, while demand by domestic consumers was largely unchanged. Nevertheless, spending by higher-income individuals on luxury travel and accommodation was reportedly strong. Several reports highlighted that lower- and middle-income households continued to seek discounts and promotions in the face of rising prices and elevated economic uncertainty. Manufacturing activity varied by District, and most reports noted challenging conditions due to higher tariffs and waning overall demand. Activity in agriculture, energy, and transportation was generally down among reporting Districts. Conditions in the financial services sector and other interest rate-sensitive sectors, such as residential and commercial real estate, were mixed; some reports noted improved business lending in recent weeks due to lower interest rates, while other reports continued to highlight muted activity. The outlook for future economic growth varied by District and sector. Sentiment reportedly improved in a few Districts, with some contacts expecting an uptick in demand over the next 6 to 12 months. However, many districts continued to expect elevated uncertainty to weigh down activity. One District report highlighted the downside risk to growth from a prolonged government shutdown.”
2. Labor Markets:
“Employment levels were largely stable in recent weeks, and demand for labor was generally muted across Districts and sectors. In most Districts, more employers reported lowering head counts through layoffs and attrition, with contacts citing weaker demand, elevated economic uncertainty, and, in some cases, increased investment in artificial intelligence technologies. Employers that reported hiring generally noted improved labor availability, and some favored hiring temporary and part-time workers over offering full-time employment opportunities. Nevertheless, labor supply in the hospitality, agriculture, construction, and manufacturing sectors was reportedly strained in several Districts due to recent changes to immigration policies. Wages grew across all reporting Districts, generally at a modest to moderate pace, and labor cost pressures intensified in recent weeks due to outsized increases in employer-sponsored health insurance expenses.”
3. Price:
“Prices rose further during the reporting period. Several District reports indicated that input costs increased at a faster pace due to higher import costs and the higher cost of services such as insurance, health care, and technology solutions. Tariff-induced input cost increases were reported across many Districts, but the extent of those higher costs passing through to final prices varied. Some firms facing tariff-induced cost pressures kept their selling prices largely unchanged to preserve market share and in response to pushback from price-sensitive clients. However, there were also reports of firms in manufacturing and retail trades fully passing higher import costs along to their customers. Waning demand in some markets reportedly pushed prices down for some materials, such as steel in the Sixth District and lumber in the Twelfth District.
Make of this what you will.
Me?
We are nearly nine months into an on and off, up and down tariff policy. Inflation is not over and tariffs are behind many, if not most, of the recent price rises. It is becoming more and more clear that exporters have cut costs about as far as they are willing, and it is also becoming more and more clear that importers have absorbed tariff costs about as much as they are able. So more and more of the new overall tariff costs are being passed through to the consumer, market share be damned.
I agree with Ed P. that President Trump was given a mandate by the American people to implement whatever policies he promised, for good or ill.
So, too, of course, was former President Biden given a mandate to implement his promised policies when he beat Trump in 2020.
Since Ed P. first prompted me to look up anew the many several meanings of mandate, I have come to internalize the idea that since the beginning of our experiment with a liberal democratic Constitutional republic each and every city or county legislator and each and every state and federal legislator, and each and every city, county, state, and federal executive who received a mandate from the electorate was then authorized to implement the policies each advocated, even if elected by only a plurality and not a majority.
As an aside, while a plurality of the vote might give one a mandate, a getting less than half of the vote in a two party system cannot, by definition, qualify as a “landslide.” So, in 2016, President Trump did not receive a landslide from the electorate, as he did not even receive a plurality of the vote. Neither did he receive one in 2024, even though he received a plurality of the vote.
But each FlaglerLive reader should consider whether the act of elected official implementing one’s policies means that the implementing elected official cannot later claim that their predecessor is completely responsible for what happens as a result of the newly implemented policies.
I argue that once a president begins tinkering with the economy by implementing his policies, he loses the right to claim that his predecessor is responsible for all of what is happening in the economy.
If this argument is economically correct, once he introduced higher tariffs into our economy,President Trump began to own a share of whatever began happened to our economy as a result. Not all of it, but some of it.
I take the position that the American economy has not yet fully recovered from the entire economic impact of the pandemic.
If that is so, then does it follow that neither Biden nor Trump can be blamed for all of what is happening in the economy because the pandemic is still responsible for some of what is still happening to our economy? By my reasoning, President Trump now owns at the very least some of what is happening in today’s economy, for good or ill, but not all.
Thank you, Ed P. for your nudge. I still disagree with you on many things, but so what?
Ray W. says
For nearly a decade, give or take, one of the issues most lied about by the professional lying class that sits at the top of one of our two parties has been the northern leg of the XL pipeline.
During the 2024 presidential campaign, President Trump occasionally grumbled about the XL pipeline. Then the grumbling went away. But in recent weeks, the grumbling has returned.
Perhaps it is time to give FlaglerLive readers some background about the issue, before the professional liars crank out their disinformation.
In recent years, crude oil export capacity at port facilities in and around Houston have been at maximum.
In 2022, former President Biden’s administration issued permits needed to construct a deepwater floating port facility off the southeastern coast of Texas, so as to relieve the pressure on the ports in or around Houston, but the Sea Port of Texas deepwater platform has yet to be built.
In 2025, President Trump’s administration issued another permit to build another deepwater facility, this one called Texas GulfLink. One or both of these artificial deepwater ports, if ever constructed, will allow for at least an additional one million barrels per day of crude oil each to be exported to whatever destination.
A third company has announced plans to build a deepwater floating dock out in the Gulf.
Only one American deepwater floating crude oil platform has been built, this one off the coast of Louisiana. Over the years, it has handled the loading of thousands of tankers, including Panamax supertankers.
Since the ports in and around Houston have trouble handling too many Panamax Supertankers, a practice has developed in which smaller tankers fill up in the ports; they then travel out into deep water where they transfer their oil at sea ship to ship to Panamax supertankers.
In recent years, crude oil output from the Permian Basin has grown so much that oil from that basin has swamped the export capacity of the ports in or around Houston.
There are two primary pipelines coming south out of Cushing, Nebraska; they transport crude oil coming of North Dakota and neighboring states to Houston.
The Keystone pipeline, originally called the southern leg of the XL pipeline, was full the day it opened in 2014. In 2022, for the year, it operated at 99% of capacity. Pipeline leaks and market fluctuations can impact all pipelines, and the Keystone Pipeline has had its share. In 2023, from what I can find, the pipeline had an 88% utilization rate for the year, in part because an oil leak closed down the pipeline for a period of time.
The second of the two pipelines coming south towards Houston out of Cushing, Nebraska, called the Flanagan South pipeline, recently (March 2025) advertised that an additional 100,000 barrels of transport capacity per day had become available, suggesting that it, too, has been operating at or near capacity.
If the northern leg of the XL pipeline were to be built, and if both primary pipelines from Nebraska to Houston are at or near capacity, then the only way that Canadian tar sands crude oil can flow all the way to Houston through the new northern leg of the XL pipeline would be if American energy producers lose at least some access to one or both of the two existing primary pipelines.
And, if neither of the two permitted deepwater platforms are actually constructed, even if the Canadian oil does make it to Houston, it will have nowhere to go, as Houston’s area ports are already operating at crude oil capacity.
I have commented on this several times.
Starting in late 2008, the Shale Revolution began.
At the time, North Dakota’s Bakken Shale Field had, for years been producing about 100,000 barrels of crude oil per day, give or take. By about 2014, the Bakken Shale Field in southwestern North Dakota and neighboring states was producing over 1 million barrels of crude oil per day. But there was little pipeline capacity out of the Bakken, and what there was did not go to Houston.
The southern leg of the XL pipeline had yet to open. That meant rail companies were transporting North Dakota crude oil all the way to Houston as rapidly as the rails would permit. Oil companies were willing to pay a premium to get their oil to market. North Dakota farmers could not afford to pay that premium, so an entire winter wheat crop sat in silos and on fields near silos.
Finally, the southern leg of the XL pipeline opened and rail tank cars didn’t have to go all the way to Houston and back to North Dakota; they could go to Cushing, Nebraska and off-load the oil into the new pipeline. This was why the southern leg of the XL pipeline was full to capacity on the day it opened.
With faster turnaround times, rail companies were able to add grain cars to the mix and the winter wheat crop was delivered to market. For those of us used to seeing lengthy trains in Florida, sometimes as lengthy as 300 rail cars, remember that Florida is flat. The route from North Dakota to Houston is not flat. Locomotives cannot pull such long trains through mountains. 15 years ago, the freight yards coming out of North Dakota were built to handle 108 car trains. Since then, the freight yards have been extended, but the trains they service still are not 200 or 300 cars long.
Americans have learned much about supply chain snarls since the pandemic. Locomotives can only pull so much weight through the mountains and hills; they can pull more weight in flat terrain.
My point is that talking about building a pipeline from the Canadian tar sands fields to Cushing, Nebraska, is more than the fantasy of saying so makes it so.
If the northern leg of the XL pipeline is ever built, there will immediately be a need for another southern leg of the XL pipeline, plus a need for more storage capacity at or near the ports around Houston, plus a need for underwater pipelines going out the deepwater platforms that can pump the oil into the new Panamax supertankers that take American oil to Asia.
Make of this what you will.
Me?
I suspect that plenty of recycled lie laundering is on its way to the FlaglerLive community. Former President Biden, of course, will be the target of the lies.
If anyone thinks that Houston area ports can handle more crude oil than they are already handling, then why have three companies sought permits to build deepwater floating ports, complete with underwater pipelines (up to 45 miles long) attached to the floating ports?
BillC says
@Pierre speaks for itself- “print stupit cartoons, to show thier ignorance”. Rathsam is unwittingly hilarious.
Ray W. says
The federal fiscal year runs from October 1st through to September 30th of the following year.
The Treasury Department just released figures derived from last year’s fiscal year.
Bloomberg published a story on the data dump, from which I derived the following facts and figures:
– Total federal outlays for fiscal year 2024-2025 reached $7 trillion, up 4% from the previous year’s figure of $6.7 trillion.
– The current fiscal year’s federal budget deficit was $1.78 trillion, down from last year’s federal budget deficit of $1.82 trillion, a drop of $40 billion.
– Outlays for the Social Security Administration totaled $1.6 trillion, up 8% from the previous year’s $1.5 trillion.
– Outlays for Health and Human Services, including Medicare and Medicaid, rose 10%.
– Spending for interest on the federal debt rose to a record $1.22 trillion this year, up 7% from 2024.
– Tariff revenues into the Treasury netted $195 billion for the fiscal year, including $29.6 million during September 2025.
– After passage of the Big Beautiful Bill Act, gross corporate tax receipts into the Treasury for September, compared to receipts from last September, are down approximately 41% to $65 billion.
– The deficit to GDP ratio in fiscal year 2024 was 6.3%
– The deficit to GDP ratio in fiscal year 2025, while not yet final, is projected to be 5.9%.
A commonly accepted international standard deficit to GDP ratio is 3.0%.
Make of this what you will.
Me?
Secretary Bessent posted to X”
“Strong private sector growth alongside constrained federal spending means the deficit to GDP will take care of itself. … FY 2025’s deficit to GDP is now projected to be under 6%. And with continued fiscal restraint, we can reach 3% by 2028.”
I hope Secretary Bessent is correct. Strong GDP growth, coupled with a lessening deficit, would be a good thing. Given that the Tax Policy Center estimates that the Big Beautiful Bill Act will increase the federal debt by a total of $4.2 trillion through 2034, it might be wiser to consider Secretary Bessent’s assertion as a little bit fantastical, but we all will see.
I still consider Fed Chair Powell’s position the stronger one. By his reckoning, the U.S. should focus on reducing inflation to at or under 2% and then keep it there for at least 10 years. At the same time, GDP growth of greater than about 2.5% should be fostered, again for at least 10 years. It isn’t as if we can’t do these two things, because we came very close to that from 2011 to 2020, a string of success that was uninterrupted until the pandemic hit.
But I have my doubts.
I haven’t forgotten those several years from my youth when David Stockman testified to Congress that President Reagan’s proposed tax cut would so spur economic investment and trigger GDP growth that the growing economy would result in the proverbial rising tide that floated all boats. This supply side economic theory held that eventually Treasury revenue would rise enough through the growth to eliminate budget deficits. A few years later, Mr. Stockman admitted that the formulas he inserted into his economic algorithm didn’t work as planned, mainly because, as he claimed, the tax cut had in reality been turned by politicians into a Trojan horse that benefited only the wealthy and didn’t balance the budget.
And I haven’t forgotten the promise made by President Trump before his first tax cut was enacted into law that the cuts would so stimulate investment and trigger GDP growth that after 10 years of steady 4% growth the additional revenue derived from the growth would offset all of the revenue cut by the tax bill. In actuality, annual GDP growth in 2017 was 2.5%. In 2018: 3.0%. In 2019: 2.5%. In 2020: -2.2% (the pandemic year) At no time since the passage of Trump’s first tax cut has GDP growth come close to averaging 4.0%.
Laurel says
So, you Trump supporters think that tariffs are going to make us great again, right? Nope, I don’t think so. I don’t think that free enterprise will be alive and kicking for long. We were not treated “unfairly” as our President stated. We have always had the choice whether to buy tons of cheap items, or good items, from our neighbors. Free enterprise means choice. Free enterprise is what we have been about. That, and democracy.
During WWII, our Greatest Generation came to the aid of Europe against the Nazis and fascism. We beat the opposition, and helped to set Europe free from tyranny. That’s what allies are for. That is the very reason for diplomacy. No, tariffs are not the answer to fairness. Trump used tariffs to push our allies away from us. Trump has insulted our past U.S. Presidents. Trump has insulted our states and cities. Trump has called half our citizens “vermin.” Trump has insulted other countries. Trump has insulted our allies. He has promoted authoritarian leaders. Why? Won’t we need our allies should another country invade us? Oh, but they won’t come to our aide if we assault our own people, will they? No, they will probably think we deserve what we get. Yet, authoritarian friends of Trump may come to his aide.
No, it’s not about tariffs and fairness. It’s about the overthrow of our over 238 year old government, as established by the U.S. Constitution. Is this truly what you support? If so, at least apologize to our Greatest Generation. They gave their all to keep us free.