European anti-trust officials have carried out surprise inspections in The Hague, London and Oslo as part of a new investigation into suspected attempts at manipulating benchmark oil pricing by several oil companies, including Hague-based Royal Dutch Shell and Statoil, the government-controlled Norwegian energy company.

In a statement, the European Commission said it “…has concerns that the companies may have colluded in reporting distorted prices to a price reporting agency to manipulate the published prices for a number of oil and biofuel products.

“Furthermore, the Commission has concerns that the companies may have prevented others from participating in the price assessment process, with a view to distorting published prices.”

Oil prices assessed and published by agencies such as McGraw Hill’s Platts, Petroleum Argus and Reed’s ISIS are important references for physical delivery and derivatives markets around the world.

A Shell statement confirmed that its group companies were cooperating with the EC investigation but offered no further comment. Likewise, Statoil said it was cooperating with the inquiry, which it said related to Platts’ price assessment process for crude oil, refined oil products and biofuels.

“Platts confirms that the European Commission has undertaken a review at its premises in London this morning in relation to the Platts price assessment process,” the New York-based company said, adding it was also cooperating fully with European authorities.

If confirmed, the manipulations would be more evidence of the growing turmoil in the world energy market as the United States transforms itself from dependency on imported oil to the world’s largest energy producer, surpassing even Saudi Arabia, and the output of the Middle East, Nigeria and other oil producers begins to be consumed by the developing world.

While it is may come as a surprise to most Americans, who still see the country in thrall to the oil sheikhs, North American oil production is booming. In 2011, the U.S. became a net energy exporter for the first time since 1949.

According to the Maria van der Hoeven, executive director of the International Energy Agency, “North America has set off a supply shock that is sending ripples throughout the world. This is helping to ease a market that was relatively tight for several years.”

Thanks to rising production of shale gas, light tight oil (petroleum extracted from shale or sandstone by fracking) and Canadian oil sands, The IEA predicts North America’s output will increase by nearly 4 million barrels a day by 2018. At that rate, the U.S. will overtake Saudi Arabia by 2020 and be completely energy independent by 2030.

“The shock waves of rising U.S. shale gas, light tight oil and Canadian oil sands production are reaching virtually all recesses of the global oil market,” said the IEA in its latest report.

Will all of this change produce the one change Americans would love to see: lower prices at the pump? Not likely; high oil prices (above $70/barrel) are what make use of the new technologies feasible. However, an energy-secure U.S. could potentially save billions of dollars and thousands of lives by being able to disengage itself from the need to protect its foreign oil resources.

The media are back to fear-mongering about “record fuel prices” again and their reports need to be taken with the usual large grain of salt.

There have been some recent price shocks, most notably in California, where a refinery fire has created spot shortages and all-time record prices in some areas. However, as the charts show, the national average price has remained well below record levels all year.

What is interesting to see is the difference in ranges between the price of benchmark West Texas Intermediate Crude on the New York Mercantile Exchange and the retail price of a gallon of gasoline. While oil has remained largely in the middle of the range between the all-time record high and the lowest price since 2005, gasoline prices have remained in the upper range, significantly closer to the record high than the seven-year low.

Unlike the speculator-driven run-up in prices last spring, which were based on incorrect assumptions about the impact of sanctions on Iran and concerns about supply, the increase seen this fall does have some basis in reality. As mentioned, a West Coast refinery fire has led to record level prices in some parts of California and other refinery issues have led to speculation that there would be shortages in other parts of the United States.

As of now, the supply concerns have proved groundless and the economic slowdown in China is reducing demands, leading to a decline in oil prices, which are now closer to their 2012 low than their high for the year, let alone the record established in 2008. Since gasoline prices tend to be slower to come down than they are to go up, drivers probably won’t see significant relief for a few weeks.

One of the big questions consumers ask is why oil prices vary so much. It’s currently popular to blame President Obama or former President George W. Bush, but neither of these men had anything to do with the dramatic rises and falls in prices at the pump. If one wishes to assign blame to a President, then that President has to be Bill Clinton, who signed the Commodity Futures Modernization Act that was passed by both houses of Congress in 2000.

The CFMA was supposed to ensure the United States could maintain a competitive position in the over-the-counter derivative market by deregulating certain exchanges. Unfortunately, the CFMA was so successful, especially with the inclusion of the “Enron Loophole” championed by then-Texas Senator Phil Gramm, that it allowed the Enron debacle, the 2008 financial market meltdown and the run-up in fuel prices seen in the past few years.

A good explanation can be found in Kenneth B. Medlock III’s 2009 paper, “Who Is In The Oil Futures Market And How Has It Changed”, prepared for the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University. Medlock explains how the CFMA brought in pure speculators, such as financial institutions, that have taken over the markets and added, by some accounts, as much as $40 to the price of a barrel of crude.