WTF is up with the price of diesel??

[VINMAN]

Originally Posted by aigel

+1

Diesel price variations are tremendous. Some stations appear to carry diesel only to be able to offer the full selection of fuels. Not sure what their business model is charging $.50 / gal or more over others in town. What I find is that diesel is also cheaper along truck routes, compared to urban and suburban neighborhoods.

G

There is a Lukoil here,the diesel is .40 more a gallon then the station across the street. Unbelievably drivers still buy it there.

[EarlyPorsche]

Originally Posted by vonsmog

I just got a biodiesel system and hope to be making my own fuel very soon! As diesel is about $4.30 a gal. here. I just want to make about 30 gal. a week for my Unimogs and tractor.

Ive been thinking about doing the same for my diesel bobcat. What are you planning on using as your "crude?" Used engine oil? I hear its A-OK to use the used motor oil as long as it didnt come from a diesel engine.

[vonsmog]

Originally Posted by EarlyPorsche

Ive been thinking about doing the same for my diesel bobcat. What are you planning on using as your "crude?" Used engine oil? I hear its A-OK to use the used motor oil as long as it didnt come from a diesel engine.

I have a line on WVO from a few places, so I am hoping for about 30gal. a week. Which is about all I want to start. If it ends up being a pain in the butt, I'll just list the system I got on Craig's list and get my money back. The one I got list for $2300.00 and I only paid $1k for it new from a guy that was shipped two by mistake from Europe. The company said to keep it, as return shipping was too much, so they must have wrote it off as a loss. So it was all profit to him, and I got a great deal! Just need to get a few little extras and I should be up and running, as soon as I find the time.

[Joeaksa]

Originally Posted by vonsmog

I just got a biodiesel system and hope to be making my own fuel very soon! As diesel is about $4.30 a gal. here. I just want to make about 30 gal. a week for my Unimogs and tractor.

We are doing some bio-diesel work as well and no issues here.

What pisses me off is that diesel is so much easier to refine than car gas, then to turn around and find the price being higher. Its all taxation and surcharges.

[peppy]

Paid $3.85 a gal in Va. yesterday.

[sammyg2]

Originally Posted by kach22i

I drove a Diesel from 1985-1990, it's a conspiracy.

They don't want Americans switching to Diesel, the oil companies make more money selling gas and the by-products which comes from it.

Do some research on Rockefeller and Standard oil.

Bull flop. Rockefeller and standard oil were a century ago. Before hydrocrackers, before diesel hydrotreaters. Everything has changed.


We don't care if you use gas or diesel, as long as the market allows for profit.
We routinely modify adjust our processes to either maximize diesel or gasoline, depending on the market.
If we can make 3 cents per gallon on diesel and only 1 cent on gas, we tweak the process to make more diesel.
a few days later we might tweak to back.

The reason diesel is high than gas right now is simple supply and demand.

Lots o'folks in Europe use diesel. Lots of folks in china and India are using more and more diesel. they have huge refineries in India that can only make so much diesel, so they still have to import a little, from us. That keeps our price high.

At the same time they have a slight excess of gasoline right now due to waning demand so they export some of it, to us. That is driving the cost down.

If anyone wants to really learn about this stuff and is willing to put in the effort, as opposed to simply pulling BS theories out of your butt, go to this link and spend a week or six studying.

U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA)

[sammyg2]

Originally Posted by Joeaksa

We are doing some bio-diesel work as well and no issues here.

What pisses me off is that diesel is so much easier to refine than car gas, then to turn around and find the price being higher. Its all taxation and surcharges.

Taxes are higher on diesel than on gas, but by far the highest cost is the raw material. Crude. It doesn't cost that much more to make gas than diesel especially in California. A gallon of gas or a gallon of diesel still consumes a certain quantity of crude.

But where did you get the idea that the price at the pumps has anything to do with the cost to refine?
They two are typically not related at all.
I wish they were, then we wouldn't have to work so freaking hard to make a profit.
Out of the last 10 quarters we lost money in at least 5.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

The refineries themselves often operate at a loss in high-price-of-raw-materials environments like we have today; the costs of raw materials plus operation are not supported by market price of the refined products. However when the refineries are owned by the same companies that do extraction & supply, it doesn't really matter. The refining operation is a small piece of the puzzle. It's like saying oh woe is Walmart because their loading dock operations don't make enough profit.

To whine about how taxation is killing the refiners when they're directly supported by the suppliers raking in billions is highly disingenuous.