If you read online, and who doesn’t, you might think that under Biden the USA is actually drilling less oil now than in the past. In truth, Biden doesn’t want you to think he is oil friendly. And he did close down the building of the Keystone XL pipeline. I believe there are news stories about land Biden has protected from oil exploration. I can’t find the actual figures on that. But Biden is issuing drilling permits at a level just as high as Trump if not much higher.
As of 10/10/2022 we are drilling 12 million barrels of oil per day. The US is exporting 4.6 million barrels of oil per day. There have been some days where the export level has exploded to 10 million barrels of oil per day. At the moment we are exporting more oil than we import.
U.S. refining capacity has fallen by 5.4%, or 1.03 million bpd to 17.9 million bpd since it peaked in 2019 at 18.98 million bpd. Capacity in 2021 dropped 4.5% to 18.13 million bpd. Profit margins at U.S. refiners are up sharply despite higher oil and gas costs as demand soars for gasoline, diesel and jet fuel. And this is where Biden does get the blame for higher fuel cost. New refineries are unlikely to be built in the United States due to daunting environmental standards and policies that the Biden administration has been implementing to reduce petroleum product consumption in the future. Not only are new refineries not being built but five refineries have shut down in the United States in just the past two years. The higher prices for energy at the pump is the outgrowth of those policies and at least one source of the inflation that is wrecking the US economy.