Fuel use, sourcing and politics fueled a fascinating presentation by Kevin Slagle, Vice President of Strategic Communications at Western States Petroleum Association (WSPA) during the Minden Rotary meeting on March 7th.  WSPA (www.wspa.org) is a non profit trade association representing the 5 Western States of Nevada, Arizona, California, Oregon and Washington.  While headquartered in Sacramento, 40% of the leadership team reside in the Carson Valley.

Fuel use in Nevada is split between retail gas, diesel, jet fuel, propane and aviation use.  Since there are no refineries in Nevada, we rely on refineries in the Bay area, Southern California and Salt Lake City.  The fuel in our area fuel comes in via a pipeline that comes over the mountains into Reno and by truck from Salt Lake City.  Pipelines are at capacity and aging.  If the power goes down, the pipeline does not function, and we must rely on the trucks from Salt Lake City (and hope there is no storm prohibiting their movement).  With very few production permits being issued in California, the crude oil used for our fuels is shipped in from the Middle East, South America and other places around the world.

The political environment in California has an influence in Nevada.  For example, California law currently requires an increasing percentage of vehicles sold in the state, beginning in 2026, to be electric vehicles. By 2035, 100% of the vehicles must be EVs, and equipment like generators and snow blowers are affected by the same types of regulations.   Whether California has the infrastructure to command this edict is questionable.  What sources will produce the electricity for these vehicles?  Ideally, natural resources such as solar and wind could produce the electricity, but the State does not have that infrastructure set up yet.  So coal and nuclear power plants will need to “fuel” the electricity needs - in addition to the commercial and residential electricity needs which often experience power outages.  If Nevada were to follow California’s initiative toward electric vehicles, the fine State legislators would hopefully solve these major issues before considering implementation.

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Kevin's bio:  Kevin joined the WPSA in February 2017.  He is a die-hard San Francisco Giants Fan and Will Clark (#22) is his favorite player.  He was one of the "lucky" attendees at the 1989 World Series Game when the earthquake hit.