Why is Diesel higher??

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Anyone care to enlighten me as to why gas prices have dropped drastically here in Florida recently but diesel stays the same?? I mean why??? This makes no sense! Gas has fallen all the way to $2.34 and diesel has stayed $3.09-3.19!

Is this just pure robbery on behalf of the oil companies? Diesel is less refined and has less additives to produce, right?
 
Well its the supply and demand of diesel and home heating oil. Its a different component of the refining process. When you refine crude oil you can some of various products. That may depend upon what crude oil you are refining also. But its not as simple as saying you want to refine crude oil into gasoline or crude oil into diesel.

In the winter people in the northeast are using up large quantities to heat their comes using heating oil which is dyed diesel without much anti-gel additive.

Heating oil is a northeast thing. I have no access to natural gas. I have a gas pipeline less than 5 miles away, but no access to what it carries.

My choice is propane or heating oil.

I go through 1000 gallons of heating oil a year, give or take.
 
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Well, the EIA has some answers in their this week in petroleum for November 15th....

Long story short, gasoline supplies are high and demand is down. Distillate (not just Diesel) has low supply and demand is up. (Meaning Diesel, Heating Fuel (its heating season after all), and martime fuels)

Economics 101...
 
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As long as it stays colder than normal, heating oil and distillates are going to stay high. It's gotten bad enough that I'm thinking of changing a truck or two to a gas engine one, There's just no benefit to diesel now, at all.
 
The main reason is that diesel is used by commercial trucks, farmers and ships; all these are commercial enterprises and fuel expenses are deductible and the petroleum companies know this and exploit it. No other reason as diesel is cheaper to produce than gas
 
Originally Posted by bullwinkle
As long as it stays colder than normal, heating oil and distillates are going to stay high. It's gotten bad enough that I'm thinking of changing a truck or two to a gas engine one, There's just no benefit to diesel now, at all.



Gas engine, less MPG, less pulling power.. I am comparing my 6.6 duramax to a 2016 6.0. The 6.0 I is an absolute gas hog and a pig and a half, wouldn't take one if ya gave it to me. I'll pay a little extra for diesel. My $0.02
smile.gif
 
I always wondered why non-commercial diesel powered vehicles have to pay the same price at the pump as commercial vehicles.

Back in the early 90's around here there were a few stations that sold home heating fuel oil #2 from the pump. Seen it more than one time bobtail rigs filling their tanks. I know it's all dyed now, but I don't think it was back then, or did not pay attention to it.
 
Simple. There's low demand for diesel in your area and stations make little to no profit on the sale of fuel in general so they have little room to drop prices on their current inventory.
 
Originally Posted by BigD1
I always wondered why non-commercial diesel powered vehicles have to pay the same price at the pump as commercial vehicles.

Back in the early 90's around here there were a few stations that sold home heating fuel oil #2 from the pump. Seen it more than one time bobtail rigs filling their tanks. I know it's all dyed now, but I don't think it was back then, or did not pay attention to it.



Part of the difference is with regards to the federal road tax. It's higher for diesel because commercial vehicles are responsible for a lot of the wear/tear on the roads.
 
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Originally Posted by bullwinkle
As long as it stays colder than normal, heating oil and distillates are going to stay high. It's gotten bad enough that I'm thinking of changing a truck or two to a gas engine one, There's just no benefit to diesel now, at all.


Diesel makes little sense anymore. In PA it's about $1 more than regular and well into the high $3/gallon range. And with turbo gas engines you get the same or better performance characteristics of Diesel with less maintenance headaches. Yes, you get less MPG but $1 less per gallon buys a LOT of gas.
 
I use to travel to the Villages and our gas pricing always mirrored yours.
You are a bit high these days because several stations here are just under $2.20 for regular.
Diesel and premium here remain the "kiss of death"
 
Originally Posted by itguy08
Originally Posted by bullwinkle
As long as it stays colder than normal, heating oil and distillates are going to stay high. It's gotten bad enough that I'm thinking of changing a truck or two to a gas engine one, There's just no benefit to diesel now, at all.


Diesel makes little sense anymore. In PA it's about $1 more than regular and well into the high $3/gallon range. And with turbo gas engines you get the same or better performance characteristics of Diesel with less maintenance headaches. Yes, you get less MPG but $1 less per gallon buys a LOT of gas.


I bailed on Diesel in 2015. No regrets. I prefer the diesel experience but in modern days it just became an expensive habit.
 
There is a myth that diesel is not highly refined. It is no longer true. Modern diesel has the sulfur removed. It gets treated and cracked just like any other fuel to get the correct Cetane value (diesel equivalent to octane) . Without sulfur it now has to have lubricity additives, possibly anti-microbial , and in the winter anti-gel additives.

Rod
 
Good info, thanks all. Certainly sheds some light on things.

I love my 05 F350, just cannot beat the MPG and towing power it has. With the goose neck trailer and the horses we pull, I had to give up on gas trucks years ago, it just worked them to death. Luckily we don't use the truck very often, just the occasional horse show every now and then but with it getting cold, I wanted to go ahead and fill the tank on the truck to help with moisture and whatnot and just assumed with gas down, diesel would be too... not!
 
Originally Posted by kschachn
Originally Posted by MNgopher
Economics 101...

Yes, as opposed to the wild-eyed conspiracy theories.


No offense but you can GRAPH the price of diesel versus gasoline in a specific area daily over years using publicly available information.

You will find an inverse correlation between price changes in gas versus diesel.

So.
In our area when gas prices drop diesel tends to stay the same or increases in price, when diesel drops in price gas tends to rise in price.

This behavior correlated perfectly with only 2 exceptions in the last 15 years, with the most recent exception about 3 months ago, where gas was staying the same price but Diesel dropped below $3 for the first time in years.

When I asked I was told that the suppliers set a overall goal on revenue and make up their cut on diesel which is more like fixed demand
 
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Originally Posted by racin4ds
Anyone care to enlighten me as to why gas prices have dropped drastically here in Florida recently but diesel stays the same?? I mean why??? This makes no sense! Gas has fallen all the way to $2.34 and diesel has stayed $3.09-3.19!

Is this just pure robbery on behalf of the oil companies? Diesel is less refined and has less additives to produce, right?

Your acting like $3.19 is bad. I paid $4.05 this morning.
 
Getting the sulfur out of the diesel (ULSD) is actually a pretty expensive process... in addition to supply and demand issues
 
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