Gas Prices?

[kuzzi]

Current home town prices top out at $4.399. Here we enjoy the ethanol penalty, higher Illinois motor fuel taxes, EPA cost penalties as well as having to pay more to ship, purchase and refine Canadian heavy. I question if the above justifies up to a $1.30 per gallon price increase over what the folks pay in Alabama or South Carolina?

Too many local hands in the cookie jar methinks. 15-20% (~60cent) increase would make more sense with cost of living increases compared to those areas. The extra must come from entities wanting their "fair share".

 

Our local ESD added a small property tax increase to raise money for emergency services in the area as our apparatus fleet was aging. I think it was a 0.002% addition to the existing 0.08% rate. It raised gobs of money for the needed equipment (especially since Exxon's new 10,000 employee campus is going to be in our service jurisdiction). Other entities are thinking about doing the same just so they can get money for their own "justified" reasons (improvement of run-down districts, etc). These little drops in the pot add up after a while. Fortunately, the proceeds from the ESD tax increase are actually being used to improve our service through equipment and the hiring of full time personnel turning it into a quasi-volunteer operation. Other types of taxes can go to waste (i.e. $700 staplers).

[hybridbear]

Michigan is doing really bad now. They said MI prices are the highest in the continental US - the only place with higher prices is Hawaii ..

 

http://www.mlive.com/business/index.ssf/2013/06/analyst_michigan_gas_prices_co.html

 

Ouch! That was Minnesota a few weeks ago. I feel your pain

 

Filled up today at $3.05.9 (Tank average was 50.3 mpg)

So jealous!! :rant2:

 

I'm starting to view the pattern of refinery problems (change overs/seasonal blends/product mix issues) is an interesting opportunity for the refiners to boost income by artificially limiting supply. The outages/problems cause local/regional spikes in prices. The geographic areas impacted by the problems are large enough to generate huge jumps in income from fuel sales, while small enough to keep the issue off the national radar.

 

In my opinion, the refiners are demonstrating the inability to manage their own product output in a way to insure a reliable supply of appropriate product in dependable volumes. Or maybe there is some collusion to push prices higher by manipulation of supply. Incompetence or conspiracy? Take your pick, neither is very attractive.

 

If you view a reliable fuel supply at stable price levels as an issue of national economic security, then the next logical step is increased regulation of the refinery industry. The frequent refinery problems at widespread locations may hide this issue for a while, but eventually the refiners will be called to the woodshed. Can government regulators be any better at managing the fuel supply? The current EPA seasonal and regional blend requirements already make the refinery business very complicated. Just fuel for thought.

Great points. The corruption of capitalism pushes people to clamor for government regulation, but government regulation is no less corrupt and can even make things worse

 

Due to environmental regulations, no new refineries have been built in that last 35 years. There have been major advancements in refining techniques that would allow easier extraction of the fuels, but the EPA won't allow it unless even more gobs of money are spent to overcome environmental regulation. Even when oil was $150/bbl in 2007, there wasn't enough incentive to warrant building new refineries.

 

So while we wait, current refineries are getting older and unsafe or are being retrofitted to meet the demand that is driving prices up. California has had some refinery incidents lately and BP finally got rid of its plagued Texas City refinery. When incidents happen, massive investigations take place that just cost money for the aging refineries. I have heard talk of a new refinery in North Dakota, but I believe it is only going to be used for lowering the currently high fuel prices there and reduce their imports. Should the Keystone Pipeline get finished, the refineries would still be the old machinery in use 40 years beforehand. These refineries are necessary but we cannot make substantial upgrade to the existing infrastructure or build new ones.

 

Say you have a 35 year old car. It has issues all the time and you have to keep fixing it. You want to get a new car, but they are just too expensive, so you start saving up money for one. You are told that you cannot get a new cheap car due to regulations against you, you must get the Lexus LF-A. While you save money, your current car keeps breaking down more and more so you have to use your new car savings to fix it. Your current car is NECESSARY for you and you cannot just get an updated model, but you have to go beyond what is needed to meet regulations. In the end, it would take more time and effort than is justified to get the new car so you can choose to completely restore your current car. You aren't allowed to make any substantial upgrades, so you just get parts that match the specs of the equipment when it was new 35 years ago, maybe add AC or a slightly better engine. The car still performs as it did 35 years ago or a little better and breaks less often, but is still lacking a substantial amount of innovation and efficiency.

 

20 years ago, oil companies budgeted what it would take to be profitable, and they used $80/bbl as the standard for budgeting their operations for the next couple of decades. Now, they are planning again for the future with more expensive projects with ultra-deepwater, high temperature, and high pressure formation and are finding it hard to justify the cost of producing these fields at $95/bbl.

 

Make efficient refineries and we can yield more bang for our buck, literally.

Excellent illustration. Thank you for writing that. It helps us understand

 

That is the key here. The EPA has made it so tough with over regulating Environment controls, that it is impossible to build any new ones. So when the last few remaining ones shut down once and for all, we become solely dependent on import fuel, imagine what the cost will be then! Actually you dont have to imagine, just look at fuel prices over seas where its all imported.

 

BAN the EPA!

Ban the EPA!! That would also get rid of the 47/47/47 debate!

 

It's the Governments Fault, Fire them all! All of them!

Both mainstream political parties have shown themselves to be hopelessly corrupt, the system is broken

 

As an addendum, say you did work from your 35 year old car. You would have to start charging customers more to keep up repairs. They would not be happy to see that you're charging more but providing the same service with an aging vehicle. But it's not your fault, it's the regulation against you. No one realizes that because all they see is you, you are the face of the service, not the regulators.

Hmmmm so then why don't the oil companies blame the regulators when they're being thrown under the bus in the media?

 

Prices in my hometown today range from $4.39.9 - $4.17.9 for regular per Gas Buddy.

 

I've concluded that retail pricing of gasoline is based on perception of what major oil companies think customers expect to pay given "conditions" of the local market. Our news media helps them by publicizing negative reports on price from blend changes effecting refinery capacity, pipeline problems, refinery fires, oil sheiks farting....blah, blah, blah. Price goes up because of summer blend and price goes up because of winter blend and it's oh so slow to recede..

 

Last I heard, most blending was done at the bulk terminals not refineries, and by the way what ever happened to tank farms evening out supply problems and those redundant pipelines. The majors are closing refineries or limiting capacity....no one wants a refinery in their backyard. Was the refinery not there when they moved in?

 

Price fixing is a no-no, then why is it that intersections with a gas station on every corner you see the same price wherever you look. While you're looking check out the satellite dishes on the roof of each station. Talk about real time price reporting and changing, it takes them longer to change the signs....oops, I forgot about those electronic signs. I can't end this rant without talking about diesel. Why is it in my travels diesel in general is less expensive in western states. Oh, I must be wrong or forgot about the EPA.

 

edit: I forgot to ask why the majors need to have their own commodity trading floors.

Agreed. When the news stations run stories about prices increasing it makes the price go up artificially. MN has a law that gas stations CANNOT sell gas below cost. No one needs to run a news story encouraging the gas station owners to raise their prices. A friend of mine owned a small gas station where his tanks were refilled about every 5-7 days. The law that he couldn't sell gas below cost would sometimes put him in a bind where other stations had dropped their prices but he couldn't lower his because he hadn't gotten a new tank in from the refinery at the lower price. On the other hand, he was an honest guy and he wouldn't artificially raise his price when he was still using up a tank purchased at a lower price while everyone else was charging more. That was a nice thing to do, but ultimately his gas station went out of business :( He tore it down, got the zoning changed and built a couple houses on the property that he now rents out.

[hybridbear]

Filled up yesterday at $3.299/gal for 87 octane. Diesel is now less than Premium here.

 

After going through the manual again, I see the compression ratio for the engine is 12.3:1, and the manual states that occasional knocking is possible. Any knock is unacceptable to me as the timing has to change to adapt which robs power. My bike is 12:1 and requires Premium since it cannot change timing on the fly. I've had to use 87 octane before and that caused knocking, never again. After I feel the car engine is broken-in I will use 87 octane for a couple of tanks, then 89, then premium. The higher the octane, the more ethanol content (up to 10% in TX). Ethanol contains ~25% less energy than gasoline and burns at a different rate (it requires a higher ignition temperature to burn fully which is why it is used as an octane booster so added compression reduces chance of auto-ignition). So what's happening inside the chamber is the gasoline in the blend is ignited first due to the lower ignition temperature. This gasoline burns and heats up the ethanol until its ignition temperature is reached. The optimal point when complete combustion is 20 degrees ATDC. The ethanol may not all be burned by that point. Advancing ignition could help the combustion complete by that point, at the risk of increasing knock. The addition of ethanol increases the combustion time of the fuel in the cylinder and yields less power. The manual says to avoid anything above 10% blend (other spots says 15% is fine).

 

Hopefully there's a middle ground here between knocking and ethanol content. Unfortunately this will probably be null for those in regions that have 10% required across all octanes. This brings up another interesting point, in the regions where an exact given ethanol content is required, who's to say that the 87 octane fuel doesn't really have a rating of 92 and the 91 octane has an actual rating of 92 as well but with different detergents? It's just a minimum octane rating. Like a machine shop meeting a given surface finish requirement, they will more times than not give you a smoother finish than specified just so there's some wiggle room.

 

Another unfortunate circumstance, with the great fuel economy as is, I don't have to fill up the tank as much, so results are long away, haha.

 

Edit: Added combustion cycle process.

Check out this thread in the C-Max Hybrid Forum. A number of owners think that there is an increase in MPG using Premium and that it is enough to offset the increased cost. Their thoughts are much along the same line about the high compression ratio of our engines.

 

You Ethanol comments are also interesting. In MN all our gas is 10% ethanol and the plan has been to move to 15% but I think that has stalled now. I wonder how you could test the octane of the gasoline

[kuzzi]

Check out this thread in the C-Max Hybrid Forum. A number of owners think that there is an increase in MPG using Premium and that it is enough to offset the increased cost. Their thoughts are much along the same line about the high compression ratio of our engines.

 

You Ethanol comments are also interesting. In MN all our gas is 10% ethanol and the plan has been to move to 15% but I think that has stalled now. I wonder how you could test the octane of the gasoline

 

I'm going to go through that thread over lunch. I have a feeling that when all blends of gasoline are required to have no less than 10% ethanol, the octane across all grades will actually be above 90 and probably not too different, so you're getting high octane for less money when you buy regular grade. Only way to test octane rating is to compress it until it explodes and compare that ratio to some other metrics. They have machines called knock engines that can vary the compression ratio to do this test.

 

 

Hmmmm so then why don't the oil companies blame the regulators when they're being thrown under the bus in the media?

 

They do lobbying straight at the source in DC, through API, www.api.org. I get daily e-mails from API for updates on the industry in general and ALWAYS the main headline is something bashing the EPA.

 

http://www.api.org/globalitems/globalheaderpages/membership/api-member-companies

 

Instead of fighting each battle alone, these companies just decided to pool resources.

 

Edit: Added hyperlink

Edited June 6, 2013 by kuzzi

[Da0ne]

Check out this thread in the C-Max Hybrid Forum. A number of owners think that there is an increase in MPG using Premium and that it is enough to offset the increased cost. Their thoughts are much along the same line about the high compression ratio of our engines.

 

You Ethanol comments are also interesting. In MN all our gas is 10% ethanol and the plan has been to move to 15% but I think that has stalled now. I wonder how you could test the octane of the gasoline

 

thats interesting anyone willing to do that to find out

[kuzzi]

http://fordcmaxhybridforum.com/topic/2013-regular-vesus-premium-fuel/?p=19530

 

This poster nailed it right on the head.

 

What works in one region may not work in another region.

 

In areas where they pay the penalty for not having ethanol in their fuel, their premium fuel may have more energy content than regular since the octane booster may be something different than ethanol. Such octane booster could be iso-octane which also increases the energy content of the fuel.

 

If ethanol IS the octane booster in a region, then power content decreases as ethanol content (octane) increases.

 

In areas where ethanol is 10% regardless of the grade, the octane rating might be the same for all the grades, just different additives. If the octane rating is NOT the same across the grades, then it is being boosted by iso-octane or something similar which would then increase the energy content of the fuel.

 

Edit: I want to clarify that when I say the octane rating is the same for all the grades, I mean that even though it may be advertised as 87/89/91 octane, they may take a sample, test them all, and the results show actual octane measurement at 92/92/92.

Edited June 6, 2013 by kuzzi

[acdii]

 

 

 

 

Edit: I want to clarify that when I say the octane rating is the same for all the grades, I mean that even though it may be advertised as 87/89/91 octane, they may take a sample, test them all, and the results show actual octane measurement at 92/92/92.

That wouldnt be the case. The octane is derived from the additives (isooctane is one) to the gasoline and is measured in such a way that no matter what the other additives are the "may" increase octane, the proportional amount of octane boost is reduced, so the final product is what they say it is. Another thing about octane, it isnt about the amount of power it can produce, but more along the lines of how much compression the engine has. The higher the compression, the higher the auto-ignition temp is, so you use higher octane to prevent pre-ignition/detonation. This allows you to get the most power out of the fuel as well, its slows its burn rate. This is why running premium in a low compression engine has negative benefits, it uses more fuel because more fuel is actually wasted by not completing its burn cycle. Faster burning fuel is good for a low compression engine.

 

Its too complicated to go over all of it, and can get very confusing too.

[mokee]

Part of the increase in cost of gasoline in my area is the ethanol requirement. IMO blending ethanol in gasoline for motor fuel is a really bad idea for a lot of reasons - phase separation, mileage penalty, corrosive properties, it takes more energy to produce then it provides, clogs fuel injectors and it has to be shipped by container, etcetera. However, we don't have a choice here.

 

I came across this site when I searched for ethanol free gas for my trailer boats. Maybe some of you might be interested in the site.

 

http://pure-gas.org/

[tr7driver]

We do have one station that sells 15% ethanol in town. The price is about 5 cents/gal below the 10% blend. I haven't tried it. I did try E85 in a rental 2013 ford explorer I had for about 3 weeks and the MPG was awful.

[kuzzi]

Ethanol, 15% cheaper, 33% less energy. :banghead:

Edited June 7, 2013 by kuzzi

[hybridbear]

When adding gas to a rental before returning it I have put E85 in because it's cheaper. I've only done it when adding a gallon or two though, not filling a whole tank. I think a previous renter had filled the 2012 Ford Fusion that Enterprise gave me once with E85 because I couldn't get more than 20 MPG out of it.

[mokee]

Hometown prices today range $4.539 - $4.299 and rising.

 

How come we never see a 3 or a 6 on the end. No sense of humor, ayeh?

[mokee]

When adding gas to a rental before returning it I have put E85 in because it's cheaper. I've only done it when adding a gallon or two though, not filling a whole tank. I think a previous renter had filled the 2012 Ford Fusion that Enterprise gave me once with E85 because I couldn't get more than 20 MPG out of it.

Pretty clever! Good reason to never buy a rental car used unless it's flex fuel.

[jeff_h]

Hometown prices today range $4.539 - $4.299 and rising.

 

Yikes - I just got back from filling up - $3.259, a whole buck per gallon difference? Wow

 

Your state has 22¢ per gallon more tax than mine, the rest of it is a lot of fluff to make up!

 

http://www.virginiagasprices.com/USA_Tax_Map.aspx

[Fastronaut]

Hometown prices today range $4.539 - $4.299 and rising.

 

How come we never see a 3 or a 6 on the end. No sense of humor, ayeh?

You sure have a high cost for fuel. Best regular around here is about $3.52 right now.

[kuzzi]

I think if you're seen pumping pure ethanol in Texas, you're lynched on the spot. If you're seen drinking ethanol, you better have enough for everyone else.

[acdii]

Looks like the high prices hit Wisconsin too. Filled up at my usual place, $4.09 for 87. The cost saver in Harvard, if you buy something and scan the receipt at the pump you save 7 cents a gallon for 25 gallons, and their regular is 89 octane, so I topped off the Flex and got 5 gallons for the JD tractor. That made it a few cents cheaper then Wisconsin and is 6 miles closer, and not as rough on the MPG.

 

I will see if this second tank in the Fusion nets about the same, if it drops I will get it from the cost savers instead, since I believe they filled the tank there.

[kuzzi]

I will be filling up the bike today. Premium is sitting around $3.50 near the house, unfortunately I will be filling up for $3.80 near work since I can't make it back home with the fuel I have. It's worth 60 cents to not have to push the bike on the freeway though.

 

For you California readers, what do you think of this?

 

http://fuelfix.com/blog/2013/06/07/californians-support-fracturing-for-its-economic-benefits/

 

This blog is sponsored by Statoil which is one of our easier to deal with customers here at work and was provided by my daily API e-mails, so I usually take this information with a grain of salt vs what the public actually believes. But in this case, I do not know how much the general public knows about the issue because there's so much misinformation out there on the subject.

Edited June 10, 2013 by kuzzi

[acdii]

As a BSG fan, I get a laugh when I hear them Fracking.

 

Anyhow, on the news, Chicago once again has the highest gas prices in the country, with the average price being $4.48.

[kuzzi]

As a BSG fan, I get a laugh when I hear them Fracking.

Haha, even as a casual sci-fi fan, I'm surprised I didn't make that connection sooner!

[hermans]

We filled up both cars yesterday. $3.31 @ Costco.

[mokee]

It's June 10th and our Costco is $4.279 today for regular per GasBuddy.com. Our closest fuel stop, Speedway, is $4.389 and our Shell is $4.499. I go to Costco in the A.M. and fill 'er up at the same pump when she needs gas because I keep a running manual calculation of MPG. I try to avoid their regular gas dumps on Tue. and Fri. because IMO it stirs up and suspends the crap in their tanks. We got enough crap around here already.

[mokee]

Check this out. Interesting toward the end.

 

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/gas-prices-over-place-heres-125227743.html

 

edit: Interesting toward the end.

Edited June 10, 2013 by mokee

[rico567]

Here in Central IL, we're still looking at ULR for $4 or a bit more, and diesel at about ten cents less. That's been unusual since the introduction of ULSD.

[jsolan]

I've seen 3.29 as the low around here this week. I have a 40 cent/gallon discount coupon at one of the grocery chains, so I'm hoping to see a 2 as the first number in my gas price for the first time in a long time next time I fill up.

 

I read an interesting article last week about states that use a gas tax. Apparently some law makers want to start adding additional fees to owners of hybrid and electric vehicles to recoup the taxes "lost" in gasoline purchases that their owners are not making. Perhaps that has been discussed here, I didn't search, just thought it was interesting.