If you think lower fuel prices will make air travel cheaper? Think again.

[thereisnospoon]

Air carriers, profitable for the first time in years are seeing a windfall in lower fuel costs, have little incentive to pass along the savings to their customers.
The carrier's strategy has finally paid off. This strategy included limiting seat availability on popular routes, cutting back on the number of flights and turning aircraft over quickly between flights.
News-Talk 1110 WBT News Why airfare keeps rising despite lower oil prices
We've all heard the gripes. Smaller seats. Lack of the most basic of customer service. Lengthy lines at security check points.
While load factors are up( number of seats sold vs the number of seats on a flight), the number of business travelers has grown, leisure travel is relatively flat. Air carriers are not concerned about those ( leisure travelers).
Leisure travelers tens to seek out lower fares, challenge crews with their needs( kids, not knowing carry on rules, etc) and tend to no show for flights.
I'd like to see some reaction from those who fly for leisure or business travel and get their observations and opinions about their experiences using air travel.

 

[waltky]

Will Venezuela be the spoiler?...

OPEC Maintains Output, Prices Hit 4-year Low
November 27, 2014 ~ The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries has decided to maintain current levels of production, despite a worldwide oil glut that has driven market prices down more than 30 percent since June.

Meeting Thursday in Vienna, Austria, OPEC oil ministers decided to maintain the present output target of 30 million barrels a day. After the announcement, the price of benchmark Brent crude fell $4, to a four-year low of $73 a barrel. The OPEC meeting, widely seen as one of the most crucial in years, came as shale oil production continues to surge in the United States. Forecasters say U.S. shale extraction will produce an additional 1 million barrels a day this year and 1 million barrels more in 2015.

With current OPEC production at 30 million barrels per day, analysts say the surge in U.S. production is proving particularly vexing for the cartel, with no OPEC strategies evident for offsetting the glut. Led by Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states of Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait, OPEC pumps about one-third of the world's oil, and has faced recent pressure from its poorer members to cut output.

However, wealthier producers argued that cutting production at this time would result in further loss of market shares in North America, where demand for OPEC oil has been sharply reduced. Analysts say the OPEC decision is a particular blow to Venezuela's economy, which is teetering on the brink of recession. The Caracas government is not seen as having the reserves necessary to ride out the weak prices, which experts say could last indefinitely.

OPEC Maintains Output Prices Hit 4-year Low

See also:

Venezuela Says Will Push OPEC Until Oil Reaches $100
November 28, 2014 — Venezuela will keep campaigning until oil prices rebound to $100 per barrel, president Nicolas Maduro said Thursday night after OPEC refused to cut output, as the cash-strapped South American country had aggressively pushed for.

Saudi Arabia blocked calls from poorer members of the OPEC oil exporter group for production cuts to arrest a slide in global prices, sending benchmark crude plunging to a fresh four-year low of around $71.25. The decision is a blow to Venezuela's flailing economy, widely believed to be in recession, and also highlights the country's diminished influence in OPEC, which it helped found. But Maduro said the country with the world's largest crude reserves is undeterred. “For now, it wasn't possible to achieve the proposal we supported with various OPEC members. There was not a consensus to make an important cutback to oil production to recuperate the markets, but above all, to recuperate the price of oil,” he said at a military event, estimating the oil price slump had curbed Venezuela's revenues by up to 40 percent.

Despite concerns over the national budget, Maduro assured citizens that their basic needs will still be covered. “If we had to reduce something in the budget, we would cut sumptuary costs, we would cut our own salary as high officials, but we will never cut even a bolivar (Venezuela's currency) from money that goes toward education, food, housing... the missions of our people,” he said. To be sure, the country has an upward battle to win over the wealthy Gulf states that have made clear they are ready to ride out the weak prices. The prospect of continued low oil prices, however, is disastrous for Venezuela, which is grappling to pay debt arrears to private companies ranging from airlines to oil partners, finance expensive social programs, and make major bond payments.

Earlier on Thursday, Venezuela's Foreign Minister and top OPEC representative Rafael Ramirez vowed to maintain contact with OPEC and non-OPEC countries to monitor markets. “We have agreed to work toward [price] stability and work to maintain contact with non-OPEC countries, which is very important,” he said in an interview with Latin American regional television station Telesur from Vienna, referring to conversations with oil producers Mexico and Russia that are not part of the group.

But Ramirez's comments were a far cry from the interview he gave Telesur earlier this month from Iran, one of several stops on his unsuccessful global tour to shore up support for an OPEC cut. Then, a confident-looking Ramirez, until September the country's oil minister and head of state oil company PDVSA, told Venezuelans a consensus for an output cut was in the works. “The issue isn't even the reduction but rather how much,” he had said.

Venezuela Says Will Push OPEC Until Oil Reaches 100

 

[whitehall]

WTF? The left wing radicals expect the Airline Industry to change the seat pattern in planes when a democrat is still in office and gas prices drop about half a dollar? Ain't gonna happen.

 

[waltky]

Granny says, "Dat's right - nothin' lasts forever...

Exclusive: New U.S. oil and gas well November permits tumble nearly 40 percent
Tue Dec 2, 2014 - Plunging oil prices sparked a drop of almost 40 percent in new well permits issued across the United States in November, in a sudden pause in the growth of the U.S. shale oil and gas boom that started around 2007.

Data provided exclusively to Reuters on Tuesday by industry data firm Drilling Info Inc showed 4,520 new well permits were approved last month, down from 7,227 in October. The pullback was a "very quick response" to U.S. crude prices, which settled on Tuesday at $66.88 CLc1, said Allen Gilmer, chief executive officer of Drilling Info. New permits, which indicate what drilling rigs will be doing 60-90 days in the future, showed steep declines for the first time this year across the top three U.S. onshore fields: the Permian Basin and Eagle Ford in Texas and North Dakota's Bakken shale.

The Permian Basin in West Texas and New Mexico showed a 38 percent decline in new oil and gas well permits last month, while the Eagle Ford and Bakken permit counts fell 28 percent and 29 percent, respectively, the data showed. That slide came in the same month U.S. crude oil futures fell 17 percent to $66.17 on Nov. 28 from $80.54 on Oct. 31. Prices are down about 40 percent since June. U.S. prices fell below $70 a barrel last week after the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries agreed to maintain output of 30 million barrels per day. Analysts said the cartel is trying to squeeze U.S. shale oil producers out of the market.

A worker monitors water tanks at a Hess fracking site near Williston, North Dakota

Total U.S. production reached an average of 8.9 million barrels per day in October, and is expected to surpass 9 million bpd in December, the highest in decades, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Gilmer said last month's pullback in permits was more about holding off on drilling good locations in a low-price environment than breaking even on well economics. "I think in this case this was just a quick response, saying 'there are enough drill sites in the inventory, let's sit back, take a look and see what happens with prices,'" he said.

In addition to the Permian, Eagle Ford and Bakken, about 10 other regions tracked in Drilling Info's data showed declines as well. The Niobrara shale in Colorado and Wyoming saw a 32 percent decline in new permits, while the Granite Wash in Oklahoma and Texas and Mississippian Lime in Oklahoma and Kansas retreated 30 percent and 27 percent, respectively. Gilmer said the pullback in new permits is a precursor to a decline in rigs. The U.S. land rig count has been largely flat since September, hovering around 1,860 oil and gas rigs, according to Baker Hughes Inc (BHI.N). "This will show up," he said. "I expect we'll start seeing rig impact in a couple of months." Share prices of drillers including Patterson UTI Energy Inc (PTEN.O), Helmerich & Payne Inc (HP.N) and Nabors (NBR.N) were slightly lower on Tuesday.

Exclusive New U.S. oil and gas well November permits tumble nearly 40 percent Reuters