Gasoline Prices Seen Averaging $3.57 per gallon, Summer 2014

OK...but how accurate is your volume measurement? Are you using the equivalent of what the Dept of weights and measures uses? Else you could easily be off by a percent just on volume. Same thing for the weight.
YMMV


Mike

 

...the first time I did it, I checked volume and it seemed to be exactly one gallon. So I decided to assume pump was accurate as a first approximation. As far as weight, that's as good as my kitchen scale - bought a 11-lb Oxo Good Grips digital - which seems to be good.

BTW, I think it's a good procedure...

 

Gas prices went up $0.20 to $3.70+ here over the weekend.

 

$4.29 / gal 4/12 Glendale Ca, and climbing......

 

Just saw a documentary about crossing the border to Mexico yesterday night: About being able to get a medical pass to circumvent the 4 hour waitingline at customs or something (I actually missed that part, but the wife told me).
The part I did see was them filling a 18.9liter jerrycan and the pumps* easily putting 20 liters in them.

Why a Dutch reporter would make a documentary about crossing the border between the USA and Mexico isn't quite clear, but the results were interesting...



*: the pumps they used in Mexico were select ones, they had a guide (former police officer) show them which ones were good (18.85 liters into the jerrycan) and which ones were bad (up to 21 liters...). The ease with which they got 10% of off the price after complaining made it quite clear the managers knew they were scamming their customers.



A somewhat similar documentary was made in the Netherlands some years back by a consumer-report type television program and they crucified some gas stations. They had to retract their statements publically because they had made errors in their assumptions** and everything turned out to be within accepted measurement inaccuracies...

**: main problem was they measured the outside temperature when filling the jerrycans instead of the actual gasoline temperature to correct their findings in the lab. Supposedly Belgium has temperature compensated gasstations since 2008, and we, their neighbors, don't. I doubt the difference is really that big though, the underground storagetanks should not have more than a few degrees difference between summer and winter resulting in hardly 1% difference.

 

The problem with your study is that you aren't measuring energy density, but just physical density. While the energy density of ethanol is lower than gasoline, its physical density is higher. Gasoline density can range for 0.71 to 0.77 g/cc, depending on blend. Ethanol is 0.789 g/cc, and it will be denser out 'in wild' with the water it picks up.

I've seen the suggestion of taking a chamois, soaking it with gasoline, and then filtering your seperated gas/water mix through it. The water should stay behind. You then have contaminated water though. I guess small amounts of that can be filtered through aquarium carbon.

For such a small amount, I would just add methanol, isopropanol, or acetone until the phases combine again, and then just mix that with gasoline for the mower our dump it into the car tank.

As to gas prices, I paid $3.65 gal last week, and now the price is $3.61. I think I'll top off tomorrow in case the prices are climbing for weekend travel.

 

I've got to say, we aren't going to get much of a clear picture of energy content from specific gravity (weight for a given volume).

Winter gas has less energy than summer gas because it has more butane which is less expensive than what they need to replace it with. Butane has lower specific gravity, but also has less energy density (energy per gallon) than the rest of gasoline. So when the butane, which causes higher evaporative emissions in warm temperatures, is removed, the gas evaporates more slowly and has more energy. How much more energy is related to what they replace the butane with, and this varies a great deal except for boutique blends that they use in heavily polluted cities.

Summer gasoline typically has 1%-3% more energy than winter gasoline, but has been known to be higher in some cases.

Ethanol also causes higher evaporative emissions and has lower energy density than the rest of gasoline, but has higher specific gravity (more ethanol will make gasoline heavier per unit volume). Ethanol can also carry water making the specific gravity higher.

I would not trust a hydrometer or weight test to tell differences in energy content. Energy content is not the only reason mpg improves in much of the country in summer.
http://www.topspeedracer.com/better-gas-mileage-in-summer-than-winter.html

 

Gas prices are pretty much steady around here while diesel prices are coming down, probably because of the dropping need for home heating oil. Maybe the purchases of diesels will go up if the price keeps coming down.

 

I suspect most of the recent gas price fluctuations was due to refineries shifting to summer blend. Diesel generally drops with demand for heating oil, but it seems stable around me. It has also been chillier than normal though.

 

I live in a suburb of Chicago. Where I live gasoline is now $4.19 a gallon. They always have an excuse to raise the prices here. Lots of Prius here too.

 

Around here, gas is hanging in the $3.25-3.29 range while diesel dropped to the $3.65-3.75 range.

 

...enjoy! VA reduced gaso tax to 11 cents/gal (less than NJ) yet we are paying $3.60-$3.80 here in north VA. My theory is this area is higher profit margin marketing region.

 

In the Washington DC Area, the credit price of E10 87 octane regular gas prices has been climbing up in the past few weeks - the credit price is now between 3.65 to 4.10 with the average about $3.75. Filled up early at $3.499/gallon (cash price for E10 87 octane) in anticipation of higher gas prices in the next few days. My guess is that energy prices will go a bit further up . Local tourism will likely get a boost as more people will vacation closer to home rather than venture further out. I'll also venture to say that the DC area will also start see more Volts, Leafs, and Plug in Prii (at least in DC MD proper where they aren't being persecuted ) - as more people seek a way to avoid high gas prices. The warmer weather is also increasing my 2010 Prius' fuel efficiency and my next fillup should be well above 60 mpg --which should dampen the gas pump sticker shock.

 

Passed 2 stations that were past $4.10/gal for regular today and another past $4.20/gal. A cheap station near my work was $3.90/gal. But, it doesn't matter to me much. I last filled up over 2 months ago and my dad's now borrowing my Prius.

I commute and mostly drive my Leaf now. I get free L2 charging at work. I also sometimes use some free public L2 charging stations and some free CHAdeMO DC fast chargers. The latter to taper pretty quick, but at the beginning, they output about 40 kW into my Leaf. I have a pic of a session (not sure if it was mine of someone else's) where after 31 mins, the car was still receiving ~9.5 kW and had received 14.8 kWh.

I only charge at home on weekends.

 

How much?

Ours is £1.27 a litre which at 3.78 litres per US gallon is £4.80 or $8.08

Holland seems to have lost the plot in the last 10-15 years. What's going on guys?

 

For chicago right now its the boutique summer blend.
Why Gas Is So Expensive During the Summer (And Especially in Chicago) | Chicago magazine | Politics & City Life April 2014
The regulators mandated that it contains lots of ethanol, which is different than just about any other city, this makes it more expensive. Drop the ethanol requirement, work with Pittsburgh, Milwaukee, other similer cities to come up with the cheapest rules that works for all, and the price would drop. Its partially EPA politics and partially corn politics.

 

...brings up a good point, somehow I had not realized that Washington DC has the best Prius incentives of any "state". Apparently the 6% excise (DC sales tax) is waived for all vehicles over 40 EPA MPG city. MD has excise tax reduction for Plug_ins.

VA is not so hot in general, however, Arlington VA does give nice tax break to hybrids & plug-ins...so yes, DC area is indeed a hot bed of Plug_ins and hybrids.

 

Us Plugin Folks . . . we continue to thank those of you who are nice enough to post the gaso updates .... even tho in part - there's a bit of pain in doing so. If it weren't for those still relying on dino-juice ... some of us might not remember how much the liquid fuel continues to cost .... except of course for the mid east skirmishes which we keep being dragged into - and interested in due to that being a substantial supply line.

Any way - all this gaso average price stuff sure makes me glad we dug deep enough to pay up front for the 2 DC/AC inverters along with the 36 225 watt solar panels way back in 2009. Oh yea ... upgraded our 100amp service to a 225amp service too. But .... 2014 is our amortization pay back year .... WOO HOO !! Just a few more bucks per gallon and the pied piper will be playing loud enough to drag a few more folks along into the solar transportation re-fueling thingy ... I hope.
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