Americans have an insatiable thirst for gasoline, and with sport-utility vehicles (SUVs) continually growing in popularity we are only getting thirstier. Just look at the roads and highways and you'll see that a severe gas shortage would practically cripple the country. Americans drive more than 2.5 trillion miles per year in automobiles, light trucks and SUVs, according to a MEMA report. That's equal to 14,000 round trips to the sun. Today, we drive almost twice as much as we did in 1980 (1.5 trillion miles), when gas prices were at their highest.

The United States consumed an average of 20 million barrels of oil per day (bbl/d) in 2004, according to the Department of Energy. Of that, 45 percent was used for motor gasoline. The rest was used for distillate fuel oil, jet fuel, residual fuel and other oils. Each barrel of oil contains 42 gallons, which yields 19 to 20 gallons of gasoline. So, in the United States, something like 178 million gallons of gasoline is consumed every day.

Typically, the demand for gas spikes during the summer, when lots of people go on vacation. Holidays like Memorial Day and the Fourth of July create logjams of tourist traffic during the summer. This high demand usually translates into higher gasoline prices, although that's not always the case. For instance, while gas prices soared 31 cents in April and early May of 2001, reaching $1.71 per gallon, prices actually declined during the 2001 summer. In 2004, prices continued to rise past the end of the summer travel season for a variety of reasons, including several hurricanes and an increase in the price of crude oil.

When you pump $20 dollars into your tank, that money is broken up into little pieces that get distributed among several entities. Gas is just like any other consumer product: There's a supply chain and several groups who are responsible for setting the price of the product. The media can sometimes lead you to believe that the price of gas is based solely on the price of crude oil, but there are actually many factors that determine what you pay at the pump. No matter how expensive gas becomes, all of these entities have to get their slice of the pie.

After seeing how much oil the United States imports, it may be surprising to know that the United States is the world's second largest producer of oil. In 2003, the United States produced about 5.7 million barrels of crude oil each day. The biggest production region is around the Gulf of Mexico, and the largest producing state is Texas. The Gulf Coast region is home to two important producing areas: the Permian Basin, located in west-central Texas and eastern New Mexico, and the federal offshore portion of the Gulf. Other big oil-producing states include Alaska, Louisiana, California, Oklahoma and Arizona.