Why is gas still so damn high

***hey_moe*** · September 29th, 2008, 14:17

All I have seen is the price of gas go up and the price for a barrel of oil go down...It is at 96.37 and the pice is still pegged......someone in making a huge profit and it ain't that third world over there.

***Rami*** · September 29th, 2008, 14:31

A few reasons:

1) Many refineries are still in the process of coming back online. Crude can drop as low as it wants, but you can't put crude in your car. Even running 100%, our refineries are stretching to meet daily demand.

2) Take into account that states like California, as well as certain regions (Atlanta, for one) have specific blends needed for those markets, and it just increases the problem.

3) Gas stations are keeping prices as high as they can for as long as they can, in order to recoup some of the revenue and business they lost when prices were even higher.

4) Gas prices have always tended to "rise like a rocket, fall like a feather." When oil first cracked $100 in early March, gas was about $3 a gallon. It will take a while for the market to regulate back to that level.

5) Much of the selling today, even in oil, was panic-related. Even if that were not true, it would take at least a couple of weeks for that $11 drop in oil to float through the remainder of the fuel market.

I hope that clears up some frustration.

Gas in Whitman, Massachusetts is $3.27 / gallon for regular.

***Mickey D*** · September 29th, 2008, 15:00

In the UK it's $10 so quit complaining.

max_thehitman · September 29th, 2008, 15:04

Someone on wallstreet is making big $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

!

I know someone has already made a car with an engine that runs on water.
Why is it not for sale?

**David_L6** · September 29th, 2008, 16:43

Originally Posted by hey_moe

All I have seen is the price of gas go up and the price for a barrel of oil go down...It is at 96.37 and the pice is still pegged......someone in making a huge profit and it ain't that third world over there.

The price of gasoline is high so our politicians can get rich(er).

**Wittpilot** · September 29th, 2008, 18:20

Originally Posted by Mickey D

In the UK it's $10 so quit complaining.

Yeah.... I do feel your pain there....but the one thing I liked about Germany when I was over there, was the public transportation system... not sure if it is similar in the UK... I imagine it is less of a "train" system like Germany has. I just liked it because you could hop on in your village and go just about anywhere you wanted to go.... At least as a visitor, I enjoyed it for the month I was there...

**airfighterjohn** · September 29th, 2008, 18:38

Originally Posted by Mickey D

In the UK it's $10 so quit complaining.

Yep--with fully 70% of that being in taxes---compared to about 20% here...

**Marlin** · September 29th, 2008, 19:12

Originally Posted by airfighterjohn

Yep--with fully 70% of that being in taxes---compared to about 20% here...

Thats what I was going to say.

***hey_moe*** · September 30th, 2008, 02:26

:costumes::costumes:

Originally Posted by David_L6

The price of gasoline is high so our politicians can get rich(er).

**stiz** · September 30th, 2008, 02:38

Originally Posted by Wittpilot

Yeah.... I do feel your pain there....but the one thing I liked about Germany when I was over there, was the public transportation system... not sure if it is similar in the UK... I imagine it is less of a "train" system like Germany has. I just liked it because you could hop on in your village and go just about anywhere you wanted to go.... At least as a visitor, I enjoyed it for the month I was there...

i'll put it this way, round here, i'd rather walk 6/7 miles and be at a place on time than risk waiting to see if the bus actually turns up, its ment to come every hour .... keyword being ment

**deathfromafar** · September 30th, 2008, 02:50

Regarding refineries, we have less than half the number we had 25 years ago and no new ones have been built. Crude supplies are still excellent, refining capacity isn't. I still favor offsets such as pushing biofuels(not federal subsidized corn based biofuels) and coal to gas/kerosene fuels. Foot dragging in certain halls of power are why things are the way they are. Not because our resources are low. We are nowhere close to becoming resource depleted.

**Snuffy** · September 30th, 2008, 03:12

Building 1 or 2 new refineries would go a long way to reduce pricing, but to build a new one from scratch is going to take 5 years minimum to bring online.

Updating our current ones with BAT would take less time, but the plant would have to be temporarily brought offline (ceasing production) while the upgrades were taking place.

Regulating recipes to one common type for every place based on the most stringent of codes would also go a long way to reducing prices because the refinery wouldn't have to reset production everytime they switch recipes.

The reducing of recipes to one common, would then impact the auto manufacturers who will no longer have to make cars to sell in specific regions, everyone would be able to drive the same model of car/truck.

On a side note: I currently engineer for a power generation company. We design and build bio-mass steam plants for the client. Its excellent fun.

**cheezyflier** · September 30th, 2008, 07:18

i was here in toronto about 6 months when i gave my car away. the public transportation here is dependable and reasonably priced. even then i only use it on bad weather days. the rest of the time i use my bicycle. i even haul our groceries with it. been car free for almost 2 years and i don't really miss it. no gas woes, no parking tickets, no extortion er, um, i mean insurance premiums.

**Lionheart** · September 30th, 2008, 10:00

Seeing who ultimately gets the profits from fuel, the dark powers that be, I can only see why the prices are staying at just about the breaking point of expense...

The funny thing is that 'gasoline' was a waist by-product of making things such as Kerosene, back in the old days. They didnt know what to do with this waist fluid. Someone found out that the newly designed piston engine (which some enthusiastic inventors were fitting into small buggies and carriages) could run on this 'stuff'. For many years, the 'waist' fluid, or gasoline, was so cheap, that it was almost like buying water, though back then, they didnt charge people for water, lol... and barely anything for 'that stuff'... :isadizzy:

We need new fuels..

Why why why why do we dig/drill/mine for 'goop' made of plants, when we can grow it out in the backyards? Why? Its grown.. Its buried. Why not plant the stuff. Then we can pick it and not have to drill for it in countries based on terrorism and death and mayhem. I dont get it.....

What we know of about making new forms of hybrid plants, we could literally engineer new fuels for engines based on plants that are developed just for this.

Meanwhile, electric car technologies are becoming incredibly good and inexpensive.

I have a business concept. Have a fleet of nice garages accross America, a corporation (sort of like Pep-Boys, but specialised and totally organized for this), that would do Electric Powerplant Conversions in one day. Drop your car off at 8AM and pick it up at 5PM and its fully electric. The engine is ripped out, (ok, unbolted), a plate is fitted to the transmission, motor bolted up, system fitted (power management box) and then the Li-On battery pack(s) through out the vehicle in key locations, such as the previous fuel tank location.

This would be a good 'emergency power deployment' for the masses if the fuel crunch gets worse...

Funny.... I remember hearing, a couple of months ago, this old guy running for some office, saying that we need to keep doing business with the arabs, we 'shouldnt' use our own oil.. That we need the arab oil. lol... I laughed my butt off......

Bill