Ending the Fuel Oil Scare

The railroads expect to hike their oil deliveries to the rationed East Coast another big notch this week to more than 800,000 barrels a day. Before fall they hope to cross the 1,000,000-barrel mark. That would mean rolling each of 62,000-odd tank cars close to 500 miles a day, far faster than the railroads ever highballed freight before.

Normal East Coast demand is 1,600,000 barrels, but gasoline rationing is already cutting this below 1,400,000.

When the railroads hit 1,000,000 barrels a day, the East can stop worrying about fuel-oil shortage, since barges, pipelines and local wells are now providing more than 300,000 barrels and will do even better with some mild sort of rationing in the Middle West. Eastbound barges via the Erie Canal are not being fully utilized, as there is no surplus for them to bring East. Thus a total of close to 1,400,000 barrels a day is in sight for the East Coast, even before the new Texas-Illinois pipeline is built and without counting on any help from the tanker convoys, which have been bringing something like 200,000 barrels a day.

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