Gasoline/Petrol Prices

Rxke · 2004-06-05 01:54:54

Kinda ironic...

Guess how much the Iraqis pay for their gasoline (they don't have refining plants, so it is imported...)

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=s … _gas]Cheap gas.

Alt2War · 2004-06-05 06:40:19

The thing with the current oil situation is a 'perfect storm' of events happened all at once to drive the price up.
A.) The whole sale price spiked as nearly a 1/4th of refining capacity was down for mainance. This is worsened by the fact that we havn't built any new refineries in this country since the 70s! (thank you EPA)
B.) The price spike was artifically heightened by the fact that it occured during the transfer to summer gas formulations which further cut into the refined oil supply. The fact that this country has over a dozen gas formulations per region even further drives up costs since gas from one region is not saleable as a comodity in the rest of the country. (again, thank you EPA)

The current price hike is a blip. yes.

Peak oil production is quickly approacing, and is a real problem.

C.) There is alot of oil left to be had, and outside of the Arabian penisula. Siberia has huge basically untapped oil reserves that once brought online will bring oil costs down, and will help break the strangle hold the anti-american nations of OPEC have on our economy. If we could get the green light from our friends in the EPA (see a trend yet) there are also huge reserves of oil off the California Coast and the Gulf of Mexico.

Yes, there is a ton of oil left. You are forgetting 1: Ever increasing deamnd 2: ever depleting wells, and 3: ever increasing difficulty in reaching untapped oil.

Oil production follows a bell curve. Ever increasing demand drives us towards drilling more and more wells. But we are dealing with a finite resource. At some point the addiditon of new oil sources will only serve to compensate for the died up sources. Shortly after the addition of new sources cannot keep up with the loss old ones.

Simply maintaining our current rate of world oil production would be a disaster on the world economy itself, as the demand for oil increases at a rate of 2million barres/day per year.

I hardly think that this situation will bring about the end of the western way of life since oil prices should finally stablize and start to fall again after summer, and become significantly become devalues when the Siberian oil supply comes online and OPEC looses it's price setting ability, althought this does undermine the disturbing fact that our economy is dependent on a foreign resource which is a horrible situation from both a security stand point, both economically and militarily. We need to

Oil prices will go down, of course, eventually. This price spike is a blip.

The problem of peak oil production rapidly approacing is a very real and ever approaching threat.

A.) Get past the prohibition of new nuclear power plants in this country. In the near term this is the most economically and enviromentally viable option. Nuclear power plants are clean, and they are cheap and they are avalible now. They are also the most logical starting point for hydrogen refineries.

Many environmentalist organizations are currently revising or revisiting their position on Nuke power as we speak.

B.) Offer large incentives and tax breaks for laying hydrogen pipelines and stations as well as fuel cell and hydrogen powered cars. (such as the Mazda RX-8 hydrogen)

I think we should go further than that.

I don't buy this as an enviromental issue at all, since all the data I've seen is completely insubstantial on global warming, but I am adimant that our country needs to become energy independent. It will strengthen us both economically and militarily.

Climate change is very real, but connecting climate change to petrolium product consumption is scientifically implausable. Much in the same manner that it cannot be scientifically proven that cigarette smoking causes cancer but through corrilary statistics.

Alt2War · 2004-06-05 06:44:26

Check out my sig.
I expect bio-gasoline to become popular in the coming years. There are already projects which are taking corn tailings and turning them into bio-fuels to replace (a precentage, like 5% of) gasoline on the streets. Indeed, if I recall correctly, the DoE was talking about how bio-fuels are going to be necessary if we're ever going to sustain ourselves in the short term economically. I can find the paper if you want.
Waste fuel, it's the way of the future.

edit: the cheapest gas I've ever seen was for 69 cents, when I was up in Chicago, and it was like at stations near a refinery.
I don't recall how cheap it was back in the 80's when I was growing up, though, it may have been cheaper.

The problem with Ethonol, (same with Hydrogen, and bio-fuels) is that you must spend more energy to create the fuel than you can phisically extract from it during consuption.

The law of entropy and all that.

Biofuels are great and all and will extend the life of our fossil fuels, but they are not a solution by themselves.

To conver completely to bio-fuels, we would need another source of cheap, abundant energy.

Alt2War · 2004-06-05 06:50:44

Doom and Gloom, Doom and Gloom i say!
It is not that bad. It will be a major inconvenience, and it will hurt the economy some, but it is hardly the end of the world. We will conserve, switch to electric (probably fuel cell) cars, build more power plants, etc. So it is an annoyance, but not Doom and Gloom.

The current price of Oil is artificially controlled, and kept very low.

We do have options and we can adapt, but the changes you are speaking of require a generation of time to convert at least.

Some predictions on peak oil predict that the time between peak production to terminal decline could be less than 5 years. All the while an oil dependant society continues to increase it's demands.

My point is, when Oil production stops being unable to closely follow demand, we may only have 5-10 years before the price of Oil begins moving upwards geometricly.

Could we make all the nessicary changes to our economy and infrastructure in 10 years?

Algol · 2004-06-05 07:39:55

London:

Petrol prices in some parts of london have reached £1 per litre which is roughly $6.95 a gallon.

The average nationwide petrol price is at roughly 83p per litre which is $5.77 per gallon.

DonPanic · 2004-06-05 07:57:55

LO
about 1$ a litre the most expensive in Paris (80% govt taxes)

Josh Cryer · 2004-06-06 06:56:12

Alt2War, I'm wondering how the law of entropy plays a role in keeping biofuels from being viable. The biofuels are using photosynthesis to store energy. No energy is really being "created" it's just changing forms. The question is whether or not one can take that energy and distribute it without it becoming costly. Every few miles a tanker truck goes is another gallon of biofuel that must be spent. But if local towns grew their own biofuels the economics scale a lot better. I recall reading a book awhile back that noted that the cheapest way to transport oil was via pipeline, a town with an agricultural center could theoretically grow and create biofuels and pipe it to its local stations.

But anyway, Rxke, I noticed that too. My goodness, no wonder gas prices are so astronomically high. The US is consuming at higher than highest levels because Iraq can't refine its own fuel at any major capacity and the US must export. The war in Iraq actually hasn't helped at all. Amazing. Not to make this political or anything!

Gas has a pretty high energy density (storage-wise), which is one reason I don't see it going away any time soon. We'll have to wait and see how fuel cells pan out though.

Shaun Barrett · 2004-06-06 08:10:31

Here in sunny Australia, I'm paying about $A4.00 per Imperial gallon (A90c per litre), which is quite steep by recent standards.

I seem to remember Nazi Germany producing gasoline from coal in WWII. Obviously, pumping it out of the ground is cheaper but at what price for crude oil does it become economic to make gasoline out of coal?
Australia has enough brown coal to keep us in energy for over three hundred years. Dirty stuff, I know, but if needs must ... !
There has to be a certain point at which artificially producing gasoline from coal becomes worth doing. Then, when the process is widespread and efficient, gasoline will become price-stable and may even become cheap again. And with the world's vast coal reserves, we may be able to go on running V8 SUVs for centuries to come!

Or am I dreaming?

dicktice · 2004-06-06 13:43:07

Would your filling stations supply little shovels? or are we looking at a future unexploited market, like combined ice-scrapers/squeegies, here. Maybe our things might augment your things, to keep that dirty coaldust off the windscreens. Just planning ahead, mate.

Shaun Barrett · 2004-06-07 02:05:32

Quote from Dicktice:-

Would your filling stations supply little shovels? ..

Ha-ha!! :laugh: What a comical scene that brings to mind.

But I wasn't just kidding around. I was sure I could remember reading about Nazi gasoline supplies coming from coal during the war, so I looked it up. It's actually quite interesting.

The most informative site was http://chemed.chem.purdue.edu/genchem/t … .html]THIS ONE.
For those of you with better things to do with your time than wade through the history of fuel synthesis (! ), some of the most relevant stuff is as follows:-
To cut a longish story short, you first produce something called 'synthesis gas' (CO + H2) from coal. (This requires energy to achieve and is one of the reasons crude oil has taken precedence.) Now, on with the story:-

In 1925, Franz Fischer and Hans Tropsch developed a catalyst that converted CO and H2 at 1 atm. and 250-300C into liquid hydrocarbons. By 1941, Fischer-Tropsch plants produced 740,000 tons of petroleum products per year in Germany.

As an alternative to this, you can also use synthesis gas directly to produce methanol:-
CO + 2H2 ---> CH3OH
Methanol can be used directly as a fuel or, using catalysts, be converted into gasoline.

But on with the story again:-

At the end of World War II, Fischer-Tropsch technology was under study in most industrial nations. The low cost and high availability of crude oil, however, led to a decline in interest in liquid fuels made from coal. The only commercial plants using this technology today are in the Sasol complex in South Africa, which uses 30.3 million tons of coal per year.

This is the bit which underlines what I was trying to say:-

As the supply of petroleum becomes smaller and its cost continues to rise, a gradual shift may be observed toward liquid fuels made from coal. Whether this takes the form of a return to a modified Fischer-Topsch technology, the conversion of methanol to gasoline, or other alternatives, only time will tell.

Getting all this into some kind of perspective, I found interesting facts and figures http://chemed.chem.purdue.edu/genchem/t … .html]HERE.:-

The total energy consumption in the United States for 1990 was 86*10^15 kJ. Of this total, 41% came from oil, 24% from natural gas, and 23% from coal. Coal is unique as a source of energy in the United States, however, because none of the 2,118 billion pounds used in 1990 was imported. Furthermore, the proven reserves are so large we can continue using coal at this level of consumption for at least 2000 years.

From this last statistic, I deduce that if the U.S. had to produce all its energy from its own coal, it could go on doing so at 1990 consumption rates for about another 500 years, assuming no other sources of coal were discovered in the meantime.

Ignoring CO2 emissions as a potential ongoing problem, perhaps this is one of the reasons the western world isn't panicking as much as one might expect at the prospect of declining oil supplies.
If things like solar-power, wind-power, wave-power, geothermal, cold fusion, controlled hot fusion, or exotic alternatives like the fabled zero-point energy, all come to nought in the short-to-medium term, the industrial world can fall back on hundreds of years of coal-based energy.

Phew! Looks like we can breathe a sigh of relief as, once again, we realise the sky isn't really falling at all.

Alt2War · 2004-06-07 16:40:45

Alt2War, I'm wondering how the law of entropy plays a role in keeping biofuels from being viable. The biofuels are using photosynthesis to store energy. No energy is really being "created" it's just changing forms. The question is whether or not one can take that energy and distribute it without it becoming costly. Every few miles a tanker truck goes is another gallon of biofuel that must be spent. But if local towns grew their own biofuels the economics scale a lot better. I recall reading a book awhile back that noted that the cheapest way to transport oil was via pipeline, a town with an agricultural center could theoretically grow and create biofuels and pipe it to its local stations.
But anyway, Rxke, I noticed that too. My goodness, no wonder gas prices are so astronomically high. The US is consuming at higher than highest levels because Iraq can't refine its own fuel at any major capacity and the US must export. The war in Iraq actually hasn't helped at all. Amazing. Not to make this political or anything!
Gas has a pretty high energy density (storage-wise), which is one reason I don't see it going away any time soon. We'll have to wait and see how fuel cells pan out though.

It currently takes more energy to create ethonol and infuse it into gasoline than the amount of energy ethonol release when combusted.

The cost in energy used in modern farms to raise crops is draumatically misproportioned.

If we used traditional means to farm, ie. oxen and plow, then you can actually enter a winning situation on calories spent/calories gained.

Alt2War · 2004-06-07 17:44:56

just to put into perspective:

The average 1sq meter solar cell produces 19 watts

the average barrel of oil can produce 1,700 kilowatts

It would take 149,122 square meter solar panels to replace 1 barrell of oil.

It is expected that the US will increase it's oil demand in the next year by 2 Million Barrels a day.

So if you wanted to just curb the increase of demand on oil by using solar power, you would need to create 44 million acres of solar panels, which happens to be over half the size of Arizona.

Those who say that peak oil is no problem because of the ready abundance of alternative sources of energy fail to grasp the scale at which we consume energy, and the massive undertaking it would take to replace even a small portion of our oil consuption.

Josh Cryer · 2004-06-07 18:35:37

It currently takes more energy to create ethonol and infuse it into gasoline than the amount of energy ethonol release when combusted.

I don't know where you're pulling that from. Europe is already subsidizing large portions of their gasoline reserves with biofuels, and it's not costing Europe (except in countries where the fuels are tax exempt, but that is done to further adoptation, not because it's unprofitable or unuseable).

http://www.meadbiofuel.com/MEADDOWNLOAD … ummary.PDF

Alt2War · 2004-06-08 11:42:18

It currently takes more energy to create ethonol and infuse it into gasoline than the amount of energy ethonol release when combusted.
I don't know where you're pulling that from. Europe is already subsidizing large portions of their gasoline reserves with biofuels, and it's not costing Europe (except in countries where the fuels are tax exempt, but that is done to further adoptation, not because it's unprofitable or unuseable).
http://www.meadbiofuel.com/MEADDOWNLOAD … ummary.PDF

Political issues and government subsadies make ethenol economical.

In terms of pure calories spent vs pure calories gained, ethonol is a very much a losing situation.

Euler · 2004-06-08 12:37:14

The average 1sq meter solar cell produces 19 watts
the average barrel of oil can produce 1,700 kilowatts
It would take 149,122 square meter solar panels to replace 1 barrell of oil.
It is expected that the US will increase it's oil demand in the next year by 2 Million Barrels a day.
So if you wanted to just curb the increase of demand on oil by using solar power, you would need to create 44 million acres of solar panels, which happens to be over half the size of Arizona.
Those who say that peak oil is no problem because of the ready abundance of alternative sources of energy fail to grasp the scale at which we consume energy, and the massive undertaking it would take to replace even a small portion of our oil consuption.

A modern solar panel in a sunny place(like Arizona) should be able to produce about 60 average W. A barrel of oil contains 1700 kWhours. So a barrel/day would mean about 70 kW. The average internal combustion engine is only about 25% efficient, but I will ignore that because producing and using hydrogen is almost as inefficient. So, 1180 m^2 of solar panels= 1 barrel/day. 2 million barrels/day = 2360 km^2, a square 48.6 km on a side. This is large, but it is less than 1% of the size of Arizona.

REB · 2004-06-08 12:53:26

Prices went down about 5 cents here in Space Town.

Keep dropping!

Shaun Barrett · 2004-06-09 17:28:47

Thanks, Euler, for putting the solar panel problem into a more realistic perspective. As you say, the area of panels needed to provide the extra power we're discussing here is very large but not as bad as Alt suggested.
That's not to say I think solar panels are going to solve the energy problem any time soon! Although there are hints that solar panel efficiency might be dramatically improved in the near future, we still need to be able to manufacture literally thousands of hectares of them at much less than they cost today.
But, having said that, I agree with Josh who has always pushed the idea of solar power. Even if we encourage more people to supplement power from the national grid with 'home-grown power' from solar panels on the roof etc. (a European approach to the problem), it must be a help. And, the more people start buying those panels, the more panels will have to be produced, and economies of scale will come into play to reduce costs.

I think that a combination of energy sources will be pressed into service as oil supplies begin to fail, including ground heat (geothermal), pebble-bed fission reactors, probably controlled fusion soon(ish! ) ... and there's always all that coal I mentioned, which is the most obvious stop-gap measure in the short-term.

I tend to be optimistic that when the need is great, human ingenuity comes to the fore. I prefer a 'can do' attitude rather than 'doom and gloom'.

DanielCook · 2004-06-09 18:44:44

During the boycott of South Africa in the 70's / 80's the white apartheid government instituted a programme to convert coal into oil (and other chemical products). Today, a large percentage of petroleum sold in South Africa is extracted using this process. http://www.sasol.com/sasol_internet/fro … id=1]Sasol is the only industrial facility in the world to produce petrochemicals from coal.

Ironically, SA "traded" the technology to France to obtain nuclear technology to build a nuclear power plant close to Cape Town ... and for a short while, nuclear weapons. Geopolitics

Shaun Barrett · 2004-06-09 19:54:08

Thanks, Daniel!
That fits in with the information I found while writing my post-before-last. I wasn't sure that the Sasol complex in South Africa was still producing petroleum from coal, now that the trade barriers against Apartheid have been dropped.
It's interesting to see that the process is ongoing because that means it must be reasonably cost-effective once you have the infrastructure in place.

In the absence of a viable alternative to oil over the next decade or two, I feel sure coal will once more become our chief energy source.
Perhaps the 20th century will one day be seen as 'The Oil Interval', in the centuries-long 'Age of Coal', which started in the early 19th century and may extend some centuries into the future.

So, looking at the big picture, I don't think there's any danger of a worldwide power shortage over at least the next century or two. And, with the recently renewed interest in cold fusion (apparently many scientists are now coming around to the idea that there's definitely something anomalous involved which needs more investigation), plus the tentative search for ways to tap into the theoretically huge energy in the quantum vacuum, I think new technology will provide new alternatives long before the fossil-fuels are gone.
Our problems may seem great but I believe human ingenuity is boundless when we're pushed to perform!

PurduesUSAFguy · 2004-06-09 20:42:46

Lets not forget that if price are at the near two dollar level for much longer it will become economical to start tar sand extraction, I remember that during the 70s Shell was in the process of building a massive tar sand extraction plant in Colorado but when the crisis ended the scraped the program and the town infrasturcture was turned into a retirement community. I am told my my fellow geeks in the ce and geo departments here that there is roughly 35-50 years worth of petrolium in shales and tar sands in North American alone.

I maintain that the thing we really need is a national gas standard, an massive tax breaks for nuclear, fusion, and hydrogen power.

Euler · 2004-06-10 00:07:34

Another alternative to petroleum that is enjoying growing support in the US is biodiesel. Biodiesel is made from vegetable oils, and it can be run in standard diesel engines. It can be used as either a fuel or a fuel additive (usually 20%). It has energy an energy density about 8% lower than petroleum diesel, but it runs with slightly greater efficiency and can slightly increase the power of a diesel engine. It also has a very high lubricity, which reduces the wear on the engine. Biodiesel is somewhat expensive and land intensive, but it is not prohibitively so.

US sales:
1999- 500,000 gallons
2000- 2 million gallons
2001- 5 million gallons
2002- 15 million gallons
2003- 25 million gallons

Basically, it is small but growing rapidly. Eventually, it could make up a significant portion of the US fuel supply.

DanielCook · 2004-06-10 07:22:27

The price of petrol in SA is comparable to that in the US (its about (R4/liter ... with the exchange rate at about R7 to the dollar) Considering that SA is at the end of a long supply chain and a relatively high tax surcharge - that's not too bad. It is my understanding that the relatively low cost of fuel is in a large part due to the Sasol contribution mentioned earlier.

The other plus is that relatively low-grade coal is used in the process.

The use of diesel fuels is also considerably higher in most of the rest of the world than in the US (thus impacting the relative demand for petroleum). I've seen relatively few of the newer TDI's here in the US, while they are everywhere back home (in SA).

Palomar · 2005-03-06 23:24:14

*Prices going up 12 cents per gallon on Tuesday the 8th, and yet another 12 cents per gallon by month's end. We're (my region) currently averaging $1.99 per gallon for regular, $2.09 for Plus.

News commentator mentioned increasing demand in developing nations like China and India are raising our gasoline prices. Guess we can thank Corporate America for exporting all those jobs to India. Not only are more American workers screwed out of a job, now everyone's paying the price.

Why does the phrase "shooting one's self in the foot" come to mind?

Husband and I will fill up our vehicles tomorrow, before prices jump.

--Cindy

RobS · 2005-03-07 00:24:43

I'm curious about petrol prices in the euro zone; Rik or someone else, have they gone up much? I suspect they're fairly constant because the rise in the price of petroleum in US dollars per barrel has roughly equaled the drop in the value of the dollar against the euro. A good time to be driving around in Europe, right now. . . I wish I were going over this summer . . .

-- RobS

Grypd · 2005-03-07 07:44:26

Aye they actually have slightly risen in the Uk but not too much mostly as a result of a increase in the buying power of the pound and that we are an Oil producer.

But unlike the US, fuel is commenly taxed here and in the EU in general. The current price per litre is about £1.72.

There has been some unrest over high prices in the UK in the past and since then fuel taxes have not gone up it is all down to the increases in the price of Oil.

I believe France also has had disruptions down to price of petrol and actually the Haulage unions had all the main motorways and ports blocked by trucks.

One other point to note is that the size of cars and engines over here are a lot more smaller and in general polution controls mean that small engines with higher efficiencies seem to be the norm. Actuall diesel engines in cars are one of the most commen but a lot of people are moving over to LPG gas. And LPG supplied fuel outlets are springing up everywhere.

New Mars Forums

Announcement

#26 2004-06-05 01:54:54

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#27 2004-06-05 06:40:19

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#28 2004-06-05 06:44:26

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#29 2004-06-05 06:50:44

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#30 2004-06-05 07:39:55

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#31 2004-06-05 07:57:55

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#32 2004-06-06 06:56:12

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#33 2004-06-06 08:10:31

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#34 2004-06-06 13:43:07

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#35 2004-06-07 02:05:32

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#36 2004-06-07 16:40:45

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#37 2004-06-07 17:44:56

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#38 2004-06-07 18:35:37

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#39 2004-06-08 11:42:18

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#40 2004-06-08 12:37:14

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#41 2004-06-08 12:53:26

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#42 2004-06-09 17:28:47

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#43 2004-06-09 18:44:44

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#44 2004-06-09 19:54:08

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#45 2004-06-09 20:42:46

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#46 2004-06-10 00:07:34

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#47 2004-06-10 07:22:27

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#48 2005-03-06 23:24:14

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#49 2005-03-07 00:24:43

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

#50 2005-03-07 07:44:26

Re: Gasoline/Petrol Prices

Board footer