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Gasoline Prices Seen Averaging $3.57 per gallon, Summer 2014

Discussion in 'Prius, Hybrid, EV and Alt-Fuel News' started by bwilson4web, Apr 13, 2014.

  1. KennyGS

    KennyGS Senior Member

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    This is why I always gas up when going through the Garden State. Prices are much lower, and the attendents have to pump your gas for you by law.

    Cheaper gas, and I don't have to get out of the car. (y)
     
  2. wjtracy

    wjtracy Senior Member

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    ...and PA has embarked on a course of programmed increases gaso tax, so one would think the NJ/PA price differential grows from here.
     
  3. El Dobro

    El Dobro A Member

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    Not if the bums in Trenton can help it.
     
  4. Okinawa

    Okinawa Senior Member

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    If it weren't boutique summer blend pushing gasoline prices higher in Chicago it would be something else. There is always an excuse to raise gasoline prices here.
     
  5. wjtracy

    wjtracy Senior Member

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    ...AG this article out-of-date (says 2014 buts its reprint from 2012)...almost everyone uses E10 now so Chicago is no different unless they are >10% ethanol. Here's the most recent API maps showing differing regional blends. One question it raises, all these differing RFG blends probably not needed so much now.

    US Gaso Requirements.jpg
     
  6. walter Lee

    walter Lee Hypermiling Padawan

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    The price of gas is slowly climbing in the DC Metro Area - it looks like it will be about $4/gallon this summer ... Me and my Prius are ready , but the price hike is going to make plenty of people here very unhappy.
     
  7. Even when gas is $4/gallon (it is here since I pay extra for ethanol-free) when I fill up it doesn't bother me much since I'm getting avg. 60 mpg on 5+ mile trips and when I do fill up it's like $20-$30, like back in the 90s. (y)
     
  8. El Dobro

    El Dobro A Member

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    RUG just jumped up about 14 cents around here to $3.39. The PiP just keeps looking better and better. :D
     
  9. Sergiospl

    Sergiospl Senior Member

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    Gas prices are heading north before Memorial Day!
     
  10. walter Lee

    walter Lee Hypermiling Padawan

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    Last year (2013) the first major spike in the price of gas came early in February-March which topped at about $3.75 before dropping to $3.50 per gallon. The current price curve resembles the first major spike in 2012 in the price of gas came early in March-April which topped at about $3.95 and later dropped to $3.40 per gallon. The current price increase trend is not as steep as 2011 April-May gas price spike where regular gas jumped over $4.00 per gallon. If the rate of prices increases accelerates in the next few week then it will mimic the 2011 April-May gas spike of more than $4.00 per gallon - and the chances of most of us paying more than $4/gallon for gas will be high. Normally, a gas price spike last only a month or so before the price drops off again.
     
  11. bwilson4web

    bwilson4web BMW i3 and Model 3

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    I'm bothered by the split between crude oil and retail gas prices that started 9 months ago, last July. Crude oil went up but gasoline prices did not follow. Over time, this puts the refineries in a bind that doesn't make economic sense.

    Sure there will be short-term differences, inventory adjustments, but usually the retail prices catch up . . . big time. I'm curious where the cheap gas is coming from? Europe? Did the refineries discover some new process that allows them to produce gasoline as a significantly lower price or have they changed their mix and moved the price hike to diesel and jet fuel users?

    Bob Wilson
     
  12. GrumpyCabbie

    GrumpyCabbie Senior Member

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    And economical options have been available for how long? It was their choice to choose a gas guzzler, they reap what they sow. :whistle:
     
    Zythryn, bwilson4web, jdk2 and 3 others like this.
  13. bwilson4web

    bwilson4web BMW i3 and Model 3

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    Curious, I went to the USA Energy Information Administration and selected an arbitrary, local, minimum gasoline price and plotted the weekly numbers for gasoline and diesel:
    [​IMG]
    • January 2009 - steady increase in prices, diesel and gasoline tracking
    • July 2009 - diesel increases over gasoline and never matches again
    • April 2011 - diesel prices plateau at ~$4/gal
    • September 2013 - Fall season, price gasoline increase does not show up
    Good thing there is no association with anything else . . . or this thread might be sent someplace out. Yeap, no cause and effect here at all.

    Bob Wilson
     
  14. wjtracy

    wjtracy Senior Member

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    Bob- Is the separation explained by the difference between Texas crude and Brent. When GasBuddy says crude oil price, they do not seem to say what price basis that is.
     
  15. mmmodem

    mmmodem Senior Taste Tester

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    Same here, I remember in the early 2000's it was $20-$25 a fill up for me. ($1.99 gallon) Now it's $30-$35. With 10 years of inflation, I'm really filling up for about the same cost per tank but instead of 35 mpg, I'm getting 77 MPGe.


    iPhone ?
     
  16. KennyGS

    KennyGS Senior Member

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    Our local gas prices spiked a year ago due to nearby refineries being closed, and I believe this caused increases due to greater delivery costs. Apparently they weren't making enough money at that refinery. I suppose their equipment might have been outdated, and they couldn't compete with more modern refineries.
     
  17. austingreen

    austingreen Senior Member

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    My article was fro 2012 also, and you map disticncly shows a different botique blend only sold in the chicago and Milwaukee area, a place that only covers about 4 million people. I don't know if they got it wrong, but it is highly possible that chicago does require more ethanol than other RFG cities with RVP of 7.2 or lower. Otherwise they would more easily share gas and prices would be lower when they had local refinery issues. I do not know what the ethanol percentage is in any of those places but it could be they are less than 10 for their summer blends, as ethanol raises the RVP. Chicago does get fuel from gulf refineries, unlike california, so they don't have that restriction. Higher fuel taxes in the chicago area make the prices higher than milwaukee, but there is no reason in 2014 to have a blend that is required but only covers a small number of people, it puts a strain on refineries.

    I believe in states rights, but really we ought to be very public when states do something stupid. Ill is probably adding 10 cents per gallon because of their boutique blend, California $0.30/gallon because of all of theirs. This is regulation that simply makes life harder with no reduction of pollution.
     
  18. austingreen

    austingreen Senior Member

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    We have a squeeze by regulators that want gas prices to go up, and refineries that want to maximize profit.

    The regulations are such that shortages of refinery capacity means refiners make more money. They also make it extremely risky to build a new refinery. So what we have had is the gulf coast spending a lot of money to upgrade their refineries to refine the cheapest poorest grades of crude. The east coast refineries that only were equipped to refine the easier stuff needed new investment to be profitable, but.... with the game most of the companies that could do this make more money by having them close down. This is bad for consumers, but good for the environmental lobby (we closed down that dirty refinery) and the refiners (we can charge more) and is anouther case of government acting against the best interests of citizens. A fuel tax could partially subsidize excess refining capacity and keep prices lower on the east coast.
     
  19. bwilson4web

    bwilson4web BMW i3 and Model 3

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    I wonder how many refineries the Keystone pipes could make?

    Having the Canadian crude refined 'at the well head' also lets them bury an residual material with the spoil. The smaller volume would also allow a smaller pipe to carry the refined products . . . perhaps East to Chicago, which seems to have a problem with gasoline prices.

    IMHO, it seems strange to pump crude oil 1,000 miles or so South; refine it, and; ship the products North to the Midwest and East coast.

    Bob Wilson
     
  20. austingreen

    austingreen Senior Member

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    Bob,
    Chicago has a problem with summer gas because of regulation. Change the regulation, the air can be as clean with less refining risk and cost. Right now canadian oil sands is being trucked and trained to midwest refineries. The refineries set up to handle it though are on the gulf coast. Building keystone not only creates temporary construction jobs, they cut the likelyhood of spills and the ghg emitted by the trucks and trains.

    Environmental regulations mean you can expand a refinery profitably, but you can't build new ones, the old grandfathered ones have huge advantages. The solution for canada if keystone is not built is to build a pipeline to the pacific, and ship the oil to refiners. This would relatively increase the cost of oil at the gulf and reduce it in china.

    The midwest refineries are creating a great deal of petroleum coke, that they can not process easily or sell. The gulf coast is set up to make a profit on this refining waste profit. Then again this competes with coal exports, and legislators in coal states don't really want more competition to miners.


    Diesel gets shipped and sold to europe. Petroleum coke gets exported to china, japan, mexico, morrocco and Canada (ok just the top 5). The amount of energy to pump the syn fuel from canada and oil from the midwest to the gulf in a pipeline is very small compared to trucking costs. The cost to build a new oil refinery is estimated to be around $5B, and new refineries would likely be best placed on the east coast not the midwest.