This may be an inapproriate post, and if so my apologies, but it's tips on saving gas at the pump.

1. Only buy or fill up your car or truck in the early morning when the ground temperature is still cold . Remember that all service stations have their storage tanks buried below ground. The colder the ground the more dense the gasoline, when it gets warmer gasoline expands, so buying in the afternoon or in the evening....your gallon is not exactly a gallon.


In the petroleum business, the specific gravity and the temperature of the gasoline, diesel and jet fuel, ethanol and other petroleum products plays an important role. A 1-degree rise in temperature is a big deal for this business. But the service stations do not have temperature compensation at the pumps.


2. When you're filling up do not squeeze the trigger of the nozzle to a fast mode. If you look you will see that the trigger has three (3) stages: low, middle, and high. In slow mode you should be pumping on low speed, thereby minimizing the vapors that are created while you are pumping. All hoses at the pump have a vapor return. If you are pumping on the fast rate, some of the liquid that goes to your tank becomes vapor. Those vapors are being sucked up and back into the underground storage tank so you're getting less worth for your money.


3. One of the most important tips is to fill up when your gas tank is HALF FULL or HALF EMPTY . The reason for this is, the more gas you have in your tank the less air occupying its empty space. Gasoline evaporates faster than you can imagine. Gasoline storage tanks have an internal floating roof. This roof serves as zero clearance between the gas and the atmosphere, so it minimizes the evaporation. Unlike service stations, here where I work, every truck that we load is temperature co mpensated so that every gallon is actually the exact amount.


4. Another reminder. If there is a gasoline truck pumping into the storage tanks when you stop to buy gas, DO NOT fill up--most likely the gasoline is being stirred up as the gas is being delivered, and you might pick up some of the dirt that normally settles on the bottom.

FF

Thanks for staying on point. Sorry you can't deal with reality.

Raise Fares
 

When all of the hoopla about oil at $100/bbl, or even $120/bbl reaches the power brokers in the oil industry, their response is often simple: on an inflation adjusted basis, oil is about where it should be. Few of us remember when oil was at $12/bbl in 1998 and the oil companies were on the ropes financially. In fact it was $12/bbl that drove consolidation in that industry, which is why we are experiencing $100/bbl oil today.

On the other hand, airfares when adjusted for inflation are 50% below what they were in 1978. That, more than anything is why consolidation is upon us, not because oil is $100/bbl. If oil were to reach $200/bbl, AMR would have to raise it's fares by an average of $108 per passenger (3.2 billion gallons at $6/gallon divided by 120 million passengers). While a fare increase of that magnitude is not probable in the very short term, it would still make airfares well below inflation adjusted rates from 1978.

Raise Fares, and the problem goes away.

I think the legacies would love nothing more than to raise fares. Possibly, the LCCs are prohibiting any kind of fare hike. Obviously, $10/seat on Skybus, and other bottom feeders, whose market share is admittedly minimal, are still not helping anyone.

Jungle-You are right on in terms of the market setting the rates. I still don't understand the knee jerk reaction to oil companies. The 10 percent margins of oil aren't all that great. If you think that oil companies have "obscene" profits, look at software companies. Margins are more important than the total dollars when determining obscene profits.

As Jungle has already been chastized for saying. Oil price is determined by supply and demand. Like all other assets, human emotion will push prices past where they should "rationally" go. Dotcom stocks and California real estate being the latest examples. Oil is a worldwide market. Western economies haven't increased their use of oil that much in the last few years, but Brazil, Russia, India and China have. That is > 2 BILLION people going through the Industrial Revolution in approximately 30 years which took us in the West around 100 years. So globally demand has increased quite a bit and will only get stronger.

On the supply side, there is less excess capacity than ever on the world market. Last I looked, a couple of months ago, there was only an estimated average of 1 million barrels ber day of excess supply for a demand of approx. 87 million barrells per day. (OPEC and Dept. of Energy #'s.) This is down from approximately 10 million bpd cushion last decade. It isn't the cost of the first, easiest to produce barrel of oil that sets the price, it is the next (marginal for you economists) barrel that sets the price. The biggest oil fields are declining in production at a faster rate than forecast (North Sea, Cantarell in Mexico) Saudi Arabia has been and continues to add rigs in their fields, but their capacity isn't increasing, hmmmm. The oil they do have is heavy crude which is harder to refine. Venezuela, Russia and Iran are nationalizing their industries to greater extents and histroy shows that this decreases overall production and profits for these countries. Not smart for these countries long term well-being, but look who is running them. The newest finds in the Gulf of Mexico and in Brazil are all off shore in deep water, thus the new oil is harder to get to market and more expensive. It will also be around 5 years before the first batch of oil is brought to market from these new finds. Worldwide, supply is getting tighter.

Take greater demand, tightening supply and human emotions and you have expensive oil. Yes, the fundamentals may not support $100 oil, but it doesn't support any less than $75 either. High oil is here to stay. Bush and Cheney can't control all these factors, no matter how much they may like to. Wait until the US falls into a recession and oil stays high like in the 70's. You think our industry sucks now?

$100/barrel. That's it! It is only going to go higher and higher and higher.

Blame the Saudi's. Blame the oil companies. Blame politicians. Blame speculators. Blame everyone who is responsible for this jump from $12/barrel to $100/barrel in just 10 years!!! And I blame them too!! But they are doing what is in their best interest... making money.


So let me tell you what is in our best interest (everyone else who lives in the US). Switch to alternative energy. My vote in the 2008 election is going to based solely upon who has the best stance on kicking the US addiction to oil (and I am not just talking about foreign oil, I am talking about oil...PERIOD!!!)

Jungle has a really extreme point of view... let the free market handle it. The fact is the free market is not always the best solution to a problem. If we let the "free market" handle energy prices, oil is only going to go to $200/$300/$400 a barrel until it runs out. It is only going to completely stop world economic growth in its track. If you cut the price of oil in half today, the economy would boom. It would go crazy like you have never seen before. Fixing the energy crisis can fix so many other important things (like the economy, the environment, help defense, etc..).

Someone needs to step in and lead the US into an economy powered by alternative fuels. The cheapest known way to power an automobile is using electricity. And electricity can come from sunlight, wind power, hydro power, biofuel, nuclear, or coal from right here in the United States. Why isn't EVERY car built in the US a plug-in hybrid? A $2,000 tax credit is not enough. How about a $10,000 tax credit for anyone who buys a plug-in hybrid. And for those that think that will cost the US billions in tax dollars...you are wrong. The result of millions of US citizens driving plug-in hybrid cars powered mostly by electricity will cause the economy to roar so much that all that money spend on tax credits will be made up for by additional economic spending and thus tax revenue (now that everyone a thousand extra dollars every year they DON'T need to spend on gas, and corporations save MILLIONS of energy costs which could be reinvested into growth).

But until the US does this, the price of oil is just going to go up and up and up. And honestly, I have started rooting for the price to increase. We need to switch. How about a little "free market" pressure. I personally think the "free market" will cause this to happen when oil is at about $250/barrel...But not before hurting tons of people and businesses, and completely destroying our economy as we know it.

Alternative fuels!!

Interesting point of view. What type of electric car do you own?

I think some airlines are experimenting with alternative fuels, or some blend of Jet A.

aerospacepilot,

Respectfully, GO TAKE A VALIUM!!!
Oil is hurting us right now, but it is not the problem. The problem is we are letting "greenies" choke off our energy supply. Hitler ran a war machine on coal and derivatives for more than 4 years. The US has enough coal to supply the world's energy needs for about 110 years at present levels, but remember, "coal is bad." There is about 50 years of oil supply under the Green River Formation in CO, UT, WY. Heaven forbid we pull oil from those beautiful mountains and deserts. ANWR has about 30 years of oil, but you better not disturb those caribou. Off the shores of CA there is about 50 years of oil, but CA just 2 years ago banned all offshore drilling. There is oil in the Gulf of Mexico, maybe over 100 years worth, but heaven forbid we drill for it. Iraq may hold more oil than Saudi by some estimates, but let's abandon it to the terrorists instead of helping a fledgling democracy grow into an ally. There is plenty more examples of this.
Alternative energy? Accounts for less than 3% of our current supplies and speculators are betting that we will have to import wheat for the FIRST TIME IN OUR HISTORY!!!! Why? All the wheat farmers took the gov't subsidies and grew corn. Basic foodstock prices are up almost 50% this past year. It won't be long until it makes it's way through the production chain to your store shelf. And what about alternatives that make sense like wind? The environmentalists don't want us spoiling their views of the landscapes.

So what is the point? Wake up and smell the coffee!! Enviros and government regulators want you to believe there is a crisis instead of looking for the truth. The truth is government has gotten in the way and prevented us from developing the supplies we have. It is a power grab that someone is betting they can change our society and consolidate something else: power over the people.

You go.....get on with your bad self!!!