Odessa Among Other West Texas Cities Dealing With Acute Gasoline Shortages
One in seven gas stations in Texas are without fuel due to the winter storm that hit the area last week.
According to the Midland Reporter-Telegram, the historic freeze shut down refineries and trucking and now Texas may need to seek help from other states.
GasBuddy along with the Texas Food & Fuel Association both are saying that 15% of convenience stores and gas stations statewide have empty tanks as of Wednesday morning (February 24, 2021).
Acute shortages are happening in Odessa, Lubbock, and El Paso, those are the hardest hit West Texas cities.
The freeze last week crippled the largest refineries across the country and impassible roads and diesel shortages delayed or just stopped fuel deliveries to stations statewide.
The Texas Food & Fuel Association is telling the public not to "panic buy" because they think there will be a long term shortage.
“We would ask our fellow Texans not to engage in panic buying and be patient with us,” said Paul Hardin, Texas Food & Fuel Association’s president. “We missed four days of the trucks getting to stations as we kept our drivers safe and off the roads, and we are in catch-up mode now.”
Hardin says there is plenty of fuel stored in pipelines and storage hubs for short term needs like we have now.
Also, if refinery shortages last longer than a couple of weeks, there is supplies we can depend on from other states.
All in all there is no need to panic and buy up a lot of fuel to cause even more stress and strain on the fuel supply.
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