[rxter]

My neighbor just traded in both a perfectly good 91ish 300 Z -and- a 2003ish MB cute ute and came back with a FORD F150 Sport something or other. I thought - huh? I could have got my wife a tip for that price. 23 MPG and high stylin' vs. 14 mpg and high riding. That's why there is chocolate and vanilla.

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[Cloud9...68]

[quote name='xrad' post='54536' date='Jun 10 2008, 07:50 PM']Cloud9...didn't the middle east war started about 5 years ago...? war is always a good barometer for conservation...[/quote]

I'm sorry, I don't follow...

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[Duckman]

I have two comments about gas prices to share with our group:



First, when I was in college there was an off-brand station down the street where I could buy gas for 24.9 cents per gallon.



Second, in support of previous comments from others about gas and water and beer, I can buy Pabst Blue Ribbon beer (don't laugh, it's actually very good lager) for the equivalent of $2.67 per gallon.



Drink, don't drive.

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[rxter]

[quote name='Duckman' post='54627' date='Jun 12 2008, 11:01 AM']First, when I was in college there was an off-brand station down the street where I could buy gas for 24.9 cents per gallon.[/quote]



And I though I was old..... <img src="/forum/images/smilies/968/wink.gif" class="smilie" alt="" />

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[RPM]

When I started driving in 1979 gas was about a dollar in CA. Now, based on inflation, that dollar is worth just about $3.00. So until gas crested that price last year it was actually in line with average inflation.



Now it is getting ugly... Even I started carpooling to work. Of course that means the 968 is getting more beauty rest in the garage instead of baking in a parking lot every day. Everything has an upside, you just have to squint hard enough.

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[DiREW0LF]

Paying $3.79 for regular to feed the Denali and $4.07 for 93 for the 968. Not everything in Jersey is bad, at least our gas prices are staying down a bit. <img src="/forum/images/smilies/968/blink.gif" class="smilie" alt="" />

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[flash]

i just paid $8.99/gal for 100 and $4.85 for 91 yesterday

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[gryphon]

Apparently southern Arizona people are crossing into Mexico to by gasoline now. I wonder how long that will last before the bureaucracy finds a way to end it?



Tom

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[asantana]

[quote name='gryphon' post='54734' date='Jun 13 2008, 02:02 PM']Apparently southern Arizona people are crossing into Mexico to by gasoline now. I wonder how long that will last before the bureaucracy finds a way to end it?



Tom[/quote]



People in San Diego are going to Tijuana, $2.75 a gallon down there:

http://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/16258751/detail.html



Gas down there has more dirt than normal and from what I hear they have to replace the fuel filters more often. I know cause my dad's company sells all those filters to the dealerships.

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[rob76turbo]

Cloud 9, you are right in that a lot of this run up in gas prices is being caused by speculation. Check out some of the editorials that Ed Wallace (a noted automotive journalist) has written.



Here is a link: http://www.allbusiness.com/energy-utilitie...10179487-1.html



He is a big proponent of speculation as the main reason that prices are so high. But another reason that prices are on the rise is that as China and India add more wealth for more and more of the population, that means more and more cars hitting the roads. In the future, they will be competiting more with us for energy resources. This in one reason that China has taken such a great interest in Africa. Africa has the resources but lacks the infrastructure to develop / extract and China has stepped up to create the relationships to leverage the ability to extract those resouces.



Interesting time!!

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[Cloud9...68]

[quote name='rob76turbo' post='54951' date='Jun 17 2008, 10:53 PM']Cloud 9, you are right in that a lot of this run up in gas prices is being caused by speculation. Check out some of the editorials that Ed Wallace (a noted automotive journalist) has written.



Here is a link: http://www.allbusiness.com/energy-utilitie...10179487-1.html



He is a big proponent of speculation as the main reason that prices are so high. But another reason that prices are on the rise is that as China and India add more wealth for more and more of the population, that means more and more cars hitting the roads. In the future, they will be competiting more with us for energy resources. This in one reason that China has taken such a great interest in Africa. Africa has the resources but lacks the infrastructure to develop / extract and China has stepped up to create the relationships to leverage the ability to extract those resouces.



Interesting time!![/quote]

We're getting pretty far off the original topic of this thread ( the spread between regular and premium gas), but when talking about anything related to gas prices, it's hard not to wander a bit.



I agree that speculators have a role in the unrelenting rise in oil prices, but I think that's only part of the picture, which in fact has a large number of variables, namely:



- Skyrocketing demand in countries like China, India, and other developing economies, though Wallace makes a good point that worldwide demand is cooling as the economy slows

- On a related note, the fact that the governments of many of these countries so heavily subsidize the price of gas (40 cents a gallon in Iran, 12 cents in Venezuela), distorting the supply/demand equation

- The plummeting value of the dollar

- The fact that we're not allowed by law to drill in areas that potenitally have huge oil reserves

- The fact that, like so many other industries, the oil companies have figured out that maintaining excess inventory is poisonous to profits, which is why they are keeping refining capacity at a level that barely keeps up with demand

- Environmental regulations further preventing the construction of more said refineries

- The aforementioned speculators



So, there's no one factor to blame, and it's very frustrating to listen to our politicians point the finger at each other over one paritcular factor or another.



But that doesn't make me nearly as crazy as listening to the numbskulls bleating about the wonderful virtues of "alternatives." Newsflash - all the alternatives SUCK. There is no fuel on earth that comes remotely close to gasoline in terms of ease of extraction and processing, heat content, ease of tranportation, safety, cost, etc. , and nobody is going to discover the trillions of gallons needed of some magical stuff that's going to "break our addiction" (argh, I hate that word used in this context) to oil, buried two feet under the ground in Mayberry, USA.



So what can we do? Sadly, we don't have nearly the sway over the energy markets that we did 30 years ago. About all we can do is drive less, and replace the gas guzzler (when it comes to the end of its natural life) with something much more economical. We need to start drilling everywhere we can possibly do it (though I'm not so sure the oil companies will do that as aggressively as the drilling proponents would have us believe, for the aforementioned capacity reasons), and hope somebody somewhere comes up with a breakthrough, say, in battery technology. Not a very optimistic picture, I'm afraid. We just have to realize that the extremely low fuel prices over much of the past several decades were an anomoly, get used to the high prices, and adjust accordingly.

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[PorscheDude]

[quote name='gryphon' post='54734' date='Jun 13 2008, 05:02 PM']Apparently southern Arizona people are crossing into Mexico to by gasoline now. I wonder how long that will last before the bureaucracy finds a way to end it?



Tom[/quote]



They now refer to americans as "dry backs" <img src="/forum/images/smilies/968/laugh.gif" class="smilie" alt="" />

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[flash]

there are other alternatives, but the lazy american consumer doesn't want to pay for the development of the distribution network - yes, it will be expensive at first - that is because there are so many drivers now - when gasoline first started, there weren't many cars, so it was an easy and smooth development - now we are talking about replacing something massive - that will be expensive



but, drilling everywhere we can is not the answer - we cannot drill alaska and the coast - the damage will be irreparable - that would be a very short sighted answer to a long term problem



interestingly, we had something of this conversation at the paso robles run - we talked about hydrogen, fission, fusion, and chicken poop



how geeky are we?



in the meantime, the real answer is to develop, and require the use of public transportation - until we get out of the "car with one person" mentality, we will always have this problem

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[midblu]

I subscribe to Autoweek (weekly magazine) and they are having a fifty year anniversary in a few weeks. As a run up to the celebration they publish a weekly 2 page spread titled "50 Years of Automotive Passion" which speaks to a specific year and the things that happened in the industry for that year. Included in the 2 page spread is a little box titled "Meanwhile Outside Our Car World" which speaks to the major events that happened in the world.



My favorite part of the spread is a running total of how much gas costs per gallon on a national level. I got my new issue yesterday and "50 Years of Automotive Passion" is up to the year 2004. The price of gas was $1.88 a gallon. That was 4 years ago.



Here in the LA area I am seeing on a regular basis premium always over $5 and as high as $6 and regular hovering around $4.75. Pointing out the obvious that is $3 in 4 years. Kind of scary.



Ron

94 coupe/6 speed

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[ds968]

[quote name='midblu' post='55039' date='Jun 19 2008, 08:45 AM']The price of gas was $1.88 a gallon. That was 4 years ago.

Here in the LA area I am seeing on a regular basis premium always over $5 and as high as $6

Ron

94 coupe/6 speed[/quote]



If my salary would have increased proportionately with the above noted gas price in these last four years, I would not be bitchin' at all about the current cost of a gallon... but guess what ?! <img src="/forum/images/smilies/968/dry.gif" class="smilie" alt="" /> It hasn't <img src="/forum/images/smilies/968/mad.gif" class="smilie" alt="" />

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[Cloud9...68]

To bring the discussion somewhat back on topic, I read in Yahoo Finance today that due to the average spread between regular and premium being about 40 cents/gallon, sales of premium are, understandably, plummeting. It has dropped, according to the article, from 12% a year ago, to a measley 6% today. This means that premium is sitting around in the tanks a lot longer than it used to, which I'm not sure is really a big problem, as long as it doesn't extend from the current days to weeks or months. Also, I wonder if it means the "premium" for premium will drop back closer to the ~20 cents I seem to remember a few years ago.



Back to off-topic, I also heard that China is significantly reducing their gas subsidy, which is sure to have a big impact on demand in that country. Hmmm... I wonder if we are in for a temporary drop in oil prices back to the $100/barrel range, or even lower, as people around the world cut back on their demand. Who knows, but I think that no matter what, the long term trend has to be up.



[quote name='flash' post='55035' date='Jun 19 2008, 09:47 AM']in the meantime, the real answer is to develop, and require the use of public transportation - until we get out of the "car with one person" mentality, we will always have this problem[/quote]

Yes, I don't understand peoples' aversion to public transportation. I've been riding in/driving a vanpool for the past four years now, and I would NEVER go back to subjecting my own car, or my wallet, to the abuse of a daily commute.

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[rob76turbo]

[quote name='Cloud9...68' post='55078' date='Jun 19 2008, 06:12 PM']Yes, I don't understand peoples' aversion to public transportation. I've been riding in/driving a vanpool for the past four years now, and I would NEVER go back to subjecting my own car, or my wallet, to the abuse of a daily commute.[/quote]



I hear you! I used to do a daily commute from NE Tarrant County to Downtown Dallas everyday. 90 min to 2 Hr every day (each way!), I can only imagine what that would cost now! Now my commute is to the airport and I only put gas in my car every 2nd or 3rd week.

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[Anchorman]

I just looked over the records I've kept since I purchased my 968 in April 2003. The low point on gas cost was in July 2003, at about $1.45/gallon. Today I paid $4.259. In 1966, to fill up my '62 Corvette, I paid $0.219 for Amoco premium (regular was $0.179).

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[BigL2U]

"but, drilling everywhere we can is not the answer - we cannot drill alaska and the coast - the damage will be irreparable - that would be a very short sighted answer to a long term problem"



Not even a short sighted answer to the problem. <img src="/forum/images/smilies/968/dry.gif" class="smilie" alt="" />



Funny thing about our governments (oil lobbyist) rhetoric on releasing the gas reserves in alaska. They make it seem as if the government has oil drilling teams sitting on the bench, ready to go! What the really mean is allowing preserved land rights to be purchased by oil companies. The oil companies aren't particularly interested in drilling these lands but just want to own and control the supply beneath it. The oil companies already own the land rights adjacent to the preserves and that land has just as much oil but is not being developed. Even if some oil company was going to develop the land, it would take five or ten years before they would produce any marketable oil. Does anyone really believe that the oil companies are interested in helping the price of a barrel to go down? <img src="/forum/images/smilies/968/dry.gif" class="smilie" alt="" />



America should take the lead and develop, market, and produce other viable energy sources and export them to the rest of the world. GM built a very good electric car and scrapped it. Then the Japanese built a gas electric hybrid and sold it to Americans. Now GM's is suddenly interested in building electric Hybrids? Our government cries about how expensive alternative infrastructures would be, $10B - $50B, but we're spending that much in the desert every month. <img src="/forum/images/smilies/968/wacko.gif" class="smilie" alt="" /> PLEASE WAKE ME UP!!



Sorry for the rant!!

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[Cloud9...68]

I understand the concern over drilling in environmentally sensitive areas, and I share the skepticism over the oil companies' desire to "drill everywhere," but by the same token, I get a little tired of hearing one group of people focused just on the supply side (the "drill everywhere" crowd), and another group talking only about reducing demand. To stabilize the cost of energy, we need to do both! Neither will accomplish much by itself.



As far as alternatives, I'd like somebody to please name one that's even remotely viable.



Electric cars? Great, if you never need AC, heat, or other accessories. Plus the weight and bulk of the batteries is a huge negative. We desperately need a better battery than what's available today, but very smart people have been working on battery technology for over a century, with only incremental improvements.



Ethanol? Thermodynamically, economically, and morally bankrupt. Takes more energy to produce than it contains, consumes vast amounts of water and land, competes with crops that could be used for food, it's hydroscopic, so it has to be transported in trucks rather than pipes. Overall, a total joke of a fuel, which would be a lot more funny if it isn't also one of the largest scams ever perpreptrated on the American taxpayer.



Hydrogen? Ugh. Takes VAST amounts of electricity to produce (since it doesn't exist freely in nature), has miserable heat content per unit mass, requires a huge tank to store it, doesn't burn very well in IC engines, and fuel cells are horrifically expensive. Other than that, it's great stuff.



Natural gas? Many of the same problems as hydrogen, except the production problem. And with any gaseous fuel, you can kiss your trunk goodbye.



Hybrids? Truly impressive feats of automotive engineering, but, given the fact that the have a whole separate motor, and the drive system to switch between the two, they will always be at a significant cost disadvantage relative to the tried-and-true single IC engive vehicle. It is very cool that they get better mileage in the city, which is the way most people drive, than on the highway, and for some people, they may be a good choice. But you really have to calculate the ROI to see if it makes sense for you. Also, while they may be viable in the wealthier countries, their high cost will limit their adoption where their efficiency is really needed, in the fast-growing developing world.



Overall, gasoline is a near-miraculoous fuel, fabulously well suited for automotive use. It's a fallacy to think that gasoline dominates simply because it already has an established infrastructure, or, even more ridiculously, because of some sinister collusion between the oil companies and the auto makers back in the murky dawniing of the automotive age. Its advantages in ease of extraction, ease of processing, ability to transport in pipes, its convenient, compact liquid form at room temperature, and its high heat content, are simply not going to be overcome by any of the alternatives available today, even given the fact that we have to import its stock from some not-too-pleasant countries. Barring some breathtaking breakthrough, I think we need to accept the fact that gasoiline and diesel are by far the best fuels on the planet, and focus on using them as efficiently as possible, by the automakers doing everything they can to improve the efficiency of their engines, increasing the availability and usage of public transportation as Flash says, driving less, etc. In other words, we need to do everything we can to extend the life of this wonderful fuel, because it will be a very dark day for humanity when we finally run out.

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