Diesel fuel actually cheaper than unleaded again here

Strange... haven't gone out to check yet and I don't pass diesel stations on the way to work, but that doesn't seem true nationally or in San Jose, CA per AAA Fuel Gauge Report and AAA Fuel Gauge Report yet.

 

So little diesel is produced, relative to petrol, that they do batches. The diesel now being sold was produced when crude was $40/bbl rather than $56. The previous batch may have been produced at higher crude prices.

Likewise here diesel prices were lagging being 15-16p more expensive per litre than petrol, but have now dropped to only 5p margin (well, actually they'd dropped to 6p and now petrol has gone up 1p). A large percentage of new cars - I think about 40% - are diesels but they make up a smaller proportion of the total fleet.

 

Some economists say rising gas price is a good sign that the economy is recovering...

Stop telling us lies, so-called economists! Economy is bad because greedy investors brought the oil price up to $140 last year, thus risen the cost of everything.

 

It is normal for diesel to be less than gasoline during the Summer. The last two years have been an oddity not normal.

Why are diesel prices falling? seasonal variation. Diesel fuel becomes more expensive in the winter as people use fuel oil (which is almost identical to diesel) to heat their homes. Diesel prices come down after the winter heating season. At the same time that diesel prices are coming down, gasoline prices increase as the summer vacation season heats up and gasoline use increases. This pattern repeats year after year. For weekly fuel price data (and history back to 1993) see:
U.S. Gasoline and Diesel Retail Prices and Gasoline and Diesel Fuel Update


It hasn't quite happened in my area yet. Yesterday 87 Octane was $1.989 and Diesel was 2.059. I expect by Memorial Day diesel will be less than 87 octane.

 

Same thing around here, about 6 weeks ago regular unleaded shot up from 84 cents a litre to 92 cents a litre. Diesel went down from 99 cents a litre to 79 cents a litre

 

that bad realyy bad

dont lett this happen to the US>...like in the EU.. protect yourselfs from diesel

please... fight... fight... yes you can.

 

Don't let what happen, supply and demand? The US already taxes diesel more than gasoline. In the US, diesel is usually less than 87 octane gasoline in the summer and more than 91 octane gasoline in the winter.

 

This morning, I saw diesel at 2.13, where it had been for several days, and regular at 2.19, a recent spike of two days ago from 2.16. This evening, same station had 2.19 for both regular and diesel. Normally here, regular is slightly cheaper than diesel. I use both, so I tend to keep track, at least mentally.

 

If you mean fight having 30-50% of new car fleet sales being of diesel motors, I'm also against that

Even with modern emission controls, cars like the Prius are cleaner. The EU specs still measure emissions differently than we do

Proven toxic diesel emissions (eg 2,3,7,8 tetrachlorodibenzo-penta-dioxin) are purposely ignored from current discussion of diesel engine emissions

 

Really? The refineries that I did some work for (WA, TX, LA) and toured were set up to be continuous in these units not batch as best I can recall. I was studying their steady state heat loads, and firewater systems, not the processes themselves.The production ratio of distillate (diesel and heating oil) to gasoline is about 4:9 based un EIA figures. Different sources give different results, but are in the ballpark. And for the diesel fans...consider what the impact would be on diesel price if just 10% of the U.S. gasoline fleet switched to diesel. While I do believe we will be seeing more diesel autos in the U.S., it is going to have the effect of making gasoline cheaper, and diesel more expensive.

Dubious. Diesel consumption/demand in the U.S. is more directly correlated to economic activity than in Europe from what I can tell. Plants running at very low capacity utilization mean a lot lower diesel consumption (perhaps for distribution?), but gasoline consumption does not decline as rapidly. (See the most recent EIA report, it states the latter portion and shows the relative consumption declines.) I'm not sure if this is due to the amount of long haul trucking or what. Consumer driving in the U.S. won't be reflected in diesel to the degree it is in Europe. You can see the relative effect clearly in 2008 U.S. consumption as well as EIA's projections going forward.It's hard to say how much production whipsaw is occurring due to diesel being considerably more expensive than gasoline in the U.S. for the past few years. I've watched these price switches occur several times over the past two decades, but have not watched them closely in the previous cycles.

 

I just filled up tonight at my local Shell Station. Unleaded was 3 cents cheaper than diesel. Typically, it's been about 30 - 40 cents cheaper.

 

i noticed gas at one of the cheaper places in town jumped to $2.319... getting ready for Memorial Day weekend a bit early this year!!

 

dont lett diesel cars take over like here in the EU.

 

Hi All,

Gas was $2.359 on Monday, and $2.559 in west suburban Chicagoland Yesterday. Did not notice the Diesel prices...

 

It's rare to have batch process in a refinery. Your SPC chart would look like a sine wave between UCL and LCL - cracking and fractionating are best done as steady state continuous process

Your product ratio is esentially correct for the North American market

Of course, you can design a refinery to produce more distillate and less gasoline. With our fuel demand, it would be a nightmare if even a small fraction of the consumer fleet transitioned to diesel vehicles - just from the production standpoint. It would not happen, at least now without a 3-5 year phase in

 

Why are you so opposed to diesel vehicles?

I know you have different emission requirements for diesel vs gasoline vehicles but in the US all vehicles have to meet the same requirements regardless of fuel type.

If both meet the same emission requirement why is a gasoline vehicle better than a diesel vehicle?

 

You can check the national average gasoline and diesel data together, and download historical data in excel here:
U.S. Gasoline and Diesel Retail Prices

Looks like gasoline has trended up ~4c in the last 4 weeks, diesel down about 4c in the same time. Interesting, but I'd day too little movement over too little time to really know if it means anything yet.

FWIW from the data above, it looks like diesel has been more expensive than regular gasoline:

Since 1/1/2000: 350/488 weeks, or 71.7% of the time (roughly 2.5 times as often). Over that period Diesel averaged $2.15, while regular averaged $2.02.

Since: 1/1/02: 284/383 weeks, or 74% of the time (roughly three times as often). Over that period Diesel averaged $2.34, while regular averaged $2.19.

Since 1/1/04: 229/279 weeks, or 82% of the time (roughly 4.5 times as often). Over that period Diesel averaged $2.69, while regular averaged $2.48.

In the 5 year period from 1/1/02 to 12/31/06: 174/260 weeks or 67% of the time (roughly twice as often). Over that period Diesel averaged $1.95, while regular averaged $1.88.

I think its a bit of an over simplification to say that the last two years have been an anomaly. It seems like there has been a growing trend of imbalance for at least 10 years. Is there an estimate of how many c/gal have been added by the ULSD requirement?

Rob

 

is the clean diesle jetta not putting out more Nox then the prius? or any other clean petrol car.

diesels are dirty ice's

wy are there 8 cyl diesels in your pickup trucks? that blow smoke like nothing else.... is that your us emission standard?

 

My F250 Powerstroke does not blow smoke, period. It does develop a lot of power, which is why I bought it -- to haul a 32-foot fifth wheen RV. It gets better mileage than a comparable gasoline engine (17-20 right now), is a stronger engine that doesn't break as often as a gas engine and makes enough noise that the horn never will wear out (OK, the last was a joke, but it does). And newer diesels are even cleaner, even more fuel efficient and a lot quieter.