Whats Fuel Prices In Your Area?

[Dodgy Loner]

Once these new oil finds come into the market along with ANWAR and off shore drillings, the market for oil products will fall. How far is another question. No different than timber or lumber products. Look at plywood prices from 10 years ago and now. How about corn and grain? As soon as the farmers start over producing, the prices will go down. That's the way life is.

How many players are there in the oil industry, compared to how many loggers and farmers there are?  When so much power is controlled by so few people, things work a little differently.

[tcsmpsi]

For as long as I can remember, fuel has never lowered in price.  There have been insignificant lowering of prices during significant surges, but exponentially, fuel prices have risen quite notably. 

Regardless of who drills for oil, and where they drill for it,  the cost of that production is higher due to the current rising pricing status of every aspect of its implementation.   As such, that cost will have to be passed on to insure profit. 

[Greg]

If prices stay this high (or higher, God forbid) into the winter, there will be a lot of hurtin' folks up here in Alaska.  I've heard rumors of $6 or $7 a gallon for heating oil.  If it comes to that, I'm shutting down my boiler and we'll survive.  We were burning right at 200 gallons of heating oil per month, during the real cold months (that was just to heat the crawlspace and the shop).  At $7/gallon, that'd be around $1,400/month.  No way I can afford that.

*sigh*  Might be time to pull the water softener back into the house and throw an old barrel stove in the shop.

I agree. People can always come up with a few extra $$$ here and there to put gas in the tank, or limit trips.

But when four figure heating oil bills start showing up come November, there is going to be some serious you know what hitting the fan. Particularly in areas like the northeast who are very reliant on #2 heating oil. Also, we seem to be overdue due for a protracted winter/cold snap. I seem to recall last winter was very mild in the NE.

My house in Ohio has a forced air, oil furnace. When I first bought the place, we probably heated 90% with oil, 10% wood. Next winter it will probably end up being 20/80 oil to wood. Of course, I have the heating equipment, resources and tools to burn and supply most if not all of our firewood.

Many don't, and thats what concerns me.

Greg

[Toolman]

I'm waiting for the day when wood burning will be illegal due to emissions. I'll bet the environmental extremist have guys like me on their radar. I predict a whole new set of regulations for that in near future. >:( >:(

[ohsoloco]

I paid $4.95 for diesel this morning.  It seemed like I was getting a bargain when I bought some high-test gas for the chainsaw for $4.09  :-\  Can't wait to get my motorcycle to run back and forth to work. 

Toolman, a few municipalities 'round here have already banned any new outdoor boiler installations.  Better not tell me I can't heat with my woodstove.  Other source of heat in the house is electric baseboards (I don't use them), and our electricity is supposed to jump up 63% in a year or so  :(

[Warbird]

I'm waiting for the day when wood burning will be illegal due to emissions. I'll bet the environmental extremist have guys like me on their radar. I predict a whole new set of regulations for that in near future. >:( >:(

When they try passing them wood burning regs, be sure to tell them to compare wood burning to oil burning.  With my wood stove, I burn wood waaaay cleaner than my boiler burns oil.

[SwingOak]

I paid close to $4000 this winter on heating oil. I'm going to install a coal stove this summer... If I install a wood burning stove, my homeowner's insurance goes up. But, not with coal.

[StorminN]

We made a trip down to Portland, OR this past long weekend... about four hours each way. Diesel was $4.70 at the cheapest place out here, $4.89 in Seattle, and $4.99 in a few places on the highway and in Portland.

I thought we did OK, we averaged 19.9 mpg in a Dodge Cummins pickup, with six people in the rig and a bed full of tools and luggage and such, and three ladders on the ladder rack. Regardless, it still cost us $130 to fill up.

The trip made me think about the price of oil at $130+ a barrel, and how oil is valued in US dollars... so I wondered since the dollar is getting so weak, what would oil be if it was priced in Euros or some other currency? I had heard that in Europe people are not panicking, their gas prices are not spiking... so, I looked it up and found these:

Oil Would Be $65 if the Dollar Had Stayed Strong - AGI

Oil and the Dollar - WSJ article

Weak Dollar Central to Oil Price Boom

-N.

[Greg]

Excellent point on the dollar.

Ron Paul, where are you now ???

Greg

[Gary_C]

I do not agree with the emphasis in the articles that the decline of the dollar is primarily responsible for the rise in oil prices. For whatever reasons, those articles are slanted in the wrong direction, ie to blame the dollar for the high oil prices.

I have been hearing all along that experts say that over 40 percent of the price of crude is due to the enormous amount of large speculators in the crude oil markets. And today the CFTC has taken the unprecedented step of disclosing they have a six month old and ongoing investigation into price manipulation in the crude oil markets. Here you can read the entire announcement of increased scrutiny of the crude oil markets: http://www.cftc.gov/newsroom/generalpressreleases/2008/pr5503-08.html

This is the part about the investigation:


III. Continuation of Ongoing CFTC Nationwide Crude Oil Investigation

In December of 2007, the agency's Division of Enforcement launched a nationwide crude oil investigation into practices surrounding the purchase, transportation, storage, and trading of crude oil and related derivative contracts. Although the Commission ordinarily conducts enforcement investigations on a confidential basis, the Commission is taking the extraordinary step of disclosing this investigation because of today's unprecedented market conditions. The specifics of the ongoing investigation remain confidential. All Commission enforcement inquiries are focused on ensuring that the markets are properly policed for manipulation and abusive practices.

The Acting Chairman and the Commissioners commented:

"In addition to the CFTC's ongoing examination of the role of fundamental economic forces and new investors in the recent commodity market price increases, the agency continues to pursue one of its primary missions – to deter, detect, and punish futures market manipulation.

I believe it would be more accurate to say the decline of the dollar is the RESULT of higher prices of energy and the enormous amounts of crude oil that we buy to support our energy consumption habits. 

[Toolman]

Thanks for sharing that Gary. At least that gives us a little assurance that somebodys doing something. Just checked NYMEX and saw oil down to $126.00 barrel. At this point I would be a little happy at $95.

[SwampDonkey]

It's cheaper now to use electric heat than any petroleum heat. Natural gas is  higher here than in the US because we are paying for the infrastructure to export it.  : >:( They can come up with any scheme and get away with it.

It would cost me as much to fill a 900 litre oil barrel as it costs for my whole stockpile of seasoned furnace wood. 7.5 cords


New homes being built are not even considering oil as an option.

[Ron Wenrich]

If you put a chart of the Euro against the chart with oil, you will find they pretty much run together.  As the Euro got stronger against the dollar, the price of oil went up.  That has nothing to do with speculation. 

The dollar gained strength today, and crude dropped $4.  For some reason, I'm seeing a correaltion there. 

I guess you can find an expert that will agree with any position you want to take.  I haven't heard of any that have blamed the run up to speculators.  The ones I heard said that it has a minor effect.  Maybe we have to swap experts.   ;)

[Gary_C]

If you put a chart of the Euro against the chart with oil, you will find they pretty much run together.  As the Euro got stronger against the dollar, the price of oil went up.  That has nothing to do with speculation. 

Ron, that's a "leap of logic" that I do not care to take. Just because they "run together" does not say the two are related.

For some time now, the commodity experts that I see, specifically the CBOT analysists for farm commodities have been saying we are seeing strong speculative interests, including large institutional fund buyers, pension fund managers, and other large investors that have turned to the commodities markets since the stock market has been stagnant and the real estate market is dismal. They liken this to the dot com bubble, the Enron bubble, and other stock market run ups in recent memory. And these analysists see on a daily basis the contracts, both long and short that large investors are holding. And they have been saying for some time that over 40 percent of all commodity values are due to these large speculative interests.

There have always been suspicions about the oil market being somewhat rigged by oil companies and the governments that are heavily involved in oil production. Just imagine the enormous profits that could be made by the Iranians if they one day took some of their oil profits and bought long futures contracts in the oil market and then the next day the president of Iran announced they were curtailing crude oil deliveries. I do not doubt that similiar senarios have occured at some time in the past. Unfortunately, there is probably little that can be done to stop those types of things from happening other than stop being so dependent on imported oil.

[StorminN]

Unfortunately, there is probably little that can be done to stop those types of things from happening other than stop being so dependent on imported oil.

Amen!

-N.

[Ironwood]

Update, in a rush to get to a client's house last night in NY, I left NJ w/ out filling up (fuel is cheaper there NJ), so on I-95 south  I go for Long Island, stop at the ONE diesel station I could find at 12 midnight, ..................$5.75 a gallon!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.   >:( >:(. Two bridge tolls $21 each way (Throng Neck), nice veiw of the city at night, but NOT worth $21. Man was I glad to get OUT of the City.......

[DouginUtah]

Here is a short quiz....

While researching for a post in another topic (about the government requiring the use of E85) I came upon a term I had never seen or heard of before.

Without using Google  :D , can anyone here tell me what gas 370 is?
(Even if you do use Google, it isn't easy.)

I think I know, now, but I'm not positive.   ???

[StorminN]

..................$5.75 a gallon!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!.   >:( >:(.

HOLY CRAPPOLA!

-Norm.

[SwampDonkey]

It's over $6 an imperial gallon (4.54 litres) here. About $5.25 a US gallon (3.8 litres). I think it went up $0.04 a litre yesterday.

[SwampDonkey]

It's very expensive in the Arctic in those communities. They have been discussing alternative energy sources for electricity. One idea is to use small nuclear reactors like on subs to provide electricity for 7000 homes in small communities. Kind of overkill for our northern communities unless you look at all the small villages scattered all over. Would have to look at running transmission lines all over I suppose. Canada's northern territories are huge tracks of land as anyone knows and very sparsely populated. The Russians are collaborating in talks about it. They have some rather large cities in the north compared to here.

They have plans to build a second reactor here, thus the interest in Uranium exploration. But we don't need it here. We have way more Gigawatts than we consume, unless the plan is to eliminate oil. But, I can't see that happening since Irving would go into convulsions, being the largest oil refinery in the country, getting ready to more than double production with a second refinery. During peek water flows here we don't use much oil, we have free flowing water.

[stonebroke]

I give up. what is gas 370.

Stonebroke

[little Bark]

Is gas 370 a by product of coal ?

[Ironwood]

I don't know about the 370, but there is a field of study in coal gasification, or should I say oil "shale" fluid extrication that a friend's father was involved in many years ago. I do know it is very expensive and involved to produce, but give the current cost of petroleum, it may become feasible.
i will be curious to see what hte 370 is.
Ironwood

[Toolman]

Pennsylvania is now building the nations first waste coal to diesel facility about 60 miles north of Harrisburg along I-81. I  saw it this past weekend coming back from New York. There are millions of tons of waste coal piles in those coal regions. They basicly cook the oil out the waste coal.

[SwampDonkey]

The analysts are saying the price is about to decline back to $100 a barrel soon.