Price of diesel in Seattle area?

[boyelectric]

I might be on the crack here, but it seems to me that the price of diesel has suddenly skyrocketed (over the past 3-4 weeks) from around $2.00 a gallon, to $2.55! And yet gasoline has not changed significantly. Even the cheap stations that I normally use are charging a fortune! What gives?

 

[jorpet]

Look at it from the bright side. The price spread for D2 and biodiesel is now $.60 per gallon. Maybe it will be $0 in the near future...

 

[boyelectric]

Oh, I agree, and I wish B20 was mandated... But does anyone know why the price suddenly jumped? Was there some new tax?

 

[tadc]

Same story down here in PDX.

You think that is bad, try pricing some heating oil.

 

[NickW]

I think it's supply and demand -- cold weather means more heating oil is being used and that is the same as diesel.
++++++
If you live in WA State please let your reps in Olympia know that you support the many biodiesel bills!!

Here they are:

HB 1645 Providing incentives for the use of clean-burning alternative fuels and equipment used in student transportation programs.

HB 1646 Providing tax incentives for alternative fuel.

HB 1647 Providing incentives for hydrogen and the alternative fuels marketplace.

SB 5916 Providing tax incentives for clean and alternative fuel vehicles.

 

[TornadoRed]

You might blame the Chinese. They can't build refining capacity fast enough to fuel their booming economy, so they are buying refined products. They don't have much use for unleaded gasoline, but distillates like diesel fuel and home heating oil they can use.

Also, I think the Pacific Northwest doesn't have that many refineries, so is dependent on shipments from elsewhere. Those tankers will go to China if the price is high enough.

 

[TornadoRed]

TANSTAAFL

 

[Marcb]

Diesel down here in Centralia is hovering at almost $2.70 per gallon!!!!! Yikes, this is incredible and I'm amazed at the price difference between RUL and Diesel.

 

[jorpet]

Also, I think the Pacific Northwest doesn't have that many refineries, so is dependent on shipments from elsewhere. Those tankers will go to China if the price is high enough.

Actually Washington has a surplus of refining capability and we supply most of Oregon and Northern California. A fair amount of CA's ULSD is comming from Cherry Point.

 

[TornadoRed]

Also, I think the Pacific Northwest doesn't have that many refineries, so is dependent on shipments from elsewhere. Those tankers will go to China if the price is high enough.

Actually Washington has a surplus of refining capability and we supply most of Oregon and Northern California. A fair amount of CA's ULSD is comming from Cherry Point.

This this is a mystery, because Northern California diesel is cheaper than Oregon's, and Oregon's is cheaper than Washington's.

 

[05TDIPDHappy]

Actually Washington has a surplus of refining capability and we supply most of Oregon and Northern California. A fair amount of CA's ULSD is comming from Cherry Point.

If that is true, we are getting $crewed by the oil Co.

As I passed the Fule station today it was 2.599/gal and that's at the truck stop for CASH, add .03/gal if you pay with credit or check.

At this rate I'm going to continue to look into a smal Bio-D production facility, Heck from what I have read it only costs in the 1.80 range per Gal to make Bio-D from Rapeseed or Soy beans, that includes the cost of extracting the oil.

Frustrated
from Western WA.

 

[redmondjp]

Highest I've seen here in the Seattle area is $2.75(9)/gallon just today!

This was at a Chevron station on West Valley Highway in Kent (where fuel prices used to be typically 15-20 cents cheaper per gallon compared to those up north closer to Seattle)

Other stations are around $2.50-2.60/gallon.

This plain sucks. Gone are the days when diesel was 20 cents cheaper than regular unleaded.

Takes some of the joy out of driving a diesel--but on the bright side, it makes the price of biodiesel look a lot more attractive!

 

[Dana D.]

<font color="brown">... Not really. BioD went up a dollar a gallon about the same time that dinoD did. Dr. said he was told that it's because the soy crop was bad and China has been buying up more soy lately. Quite the coincidence. Things that make you go ... hummmm. </font>

 

[Grady]

This was posted by philh in another thread on 2-15.

http://forums.tdiclub.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=943848&an=0&page=0#943848

"""This is a supply problem related to refineries taking planned and unplanned outages for maintenance. On the West Coast, specifically the Northwest market (not very liquid - fewer buyers/sellers), costs have risen ~$.20 in the last two trading days alone. The OPIS wholesale rack price for Portland has gone up $.23 in the last week, while the same price for Houston has barely moved a nickel. (BTW, I happen to work for ConocoPhillips """

Get used to the cold hard fact of being a Diesel-Head. The refiners are getting their maintenance out of the way now, instead of during a timeframe that will affect unleaded gas prices like they are affecting diesel prices now.

There are less diesel vehicles on the road, so the price increases have less of an impact. Imagine what would happen if/when unleaded prices are affected to the same degree as diesel is now.

Once goods and services fees spike as a result of the diesl price increases, then the unleaded drivers will feel the pinch too.

 

[alex wetmore]

I just did a road trip around the NW this weekend. I live in Seattle and went to La Grande, OR to meet up with DrivBiWire and get my timing belt changed (BTW, I highly recommend this if you need a timing belt, Pete is a great guy to work with and I learned a lot). Right now I'm in Portland at a friends and I'm heading back up to Seattle this afternoon.

Prices are high right now in this whole region. I ran a B30-40 blend using biodiesel from Dr Dan's and dino from a station in Issaquah. I actually wasted a little time getting on the road going by a few stations just to make sure that the $2.64 price at the Texaco near my house wasn't a mistake. It wasn't.

Sadly the B20 pump in Portland is closed. I'm going to go to Sequential biofuels and pick up some B100 today, but at $3.61 per gallon I'm not sure how much I'll pick up.

alex

 

[PDiesoiler]

$2.84.9/gal at station in Ballard. 24th & Market. This is just ridiculous when the very next station I saw was $2.59.9/gal!

 

[TornadoRed]

PDiesoiler, you will always find some stations with outrageous fuel prices. They simply don't care about selling a high volume, and they don't. You should never buy from them, because they get infrequent deliveries and there is a high probability of water condensation in their fuel tanks.

I know of a station here in San Diego County that has been charging $2.79-2.99/gallon for most of the last year. I think it was $2.79 the other day. Most stations are charging $2.29-2.39, and I found one for $2.219 and filled to the brim.

Something you may have noticed in your area... When fuel is plentiful, the independent stations are usually cheaper than the branded stations. When there's a supply shortfall, spot prices zoom and independent stations have to follow that price upward. They buy on the spot market, and it's a lot more volatile than the prices major refineries charge their affiliated stations.

 

[NoGW]

....I'm going to go to Sequential biofuels and pick up some B100 today, but at $3.61 per gallon I'm not sure how much I'll pick up.

alex

B100 was $4.20 @ the Eastgate Chevron last week!

rick

 

[boyelectric]

Diesel prices skyrocket to the $2 gallon point
March 3, 2005 by Tom Bacon, Spokane Public Radio

Inland Northwest drivers are beginning to wince every time they pull up to fill up, with unleaded gasoline prices again nudging $2 a gallon.

As bad as that is, diesel prices are even higher, right now at record highs of $2.60 a gallon in Spokane.

It wasn’t too long ago that diesel prices were lower than gasoline prices. But Dave Overstreet of the Spokane AAA said the fuel markets have been changing over the past year or so.

“Most recently we have actually seen record diesel prices around the country, and in the Northwest we just hit a record price for diesel about a week ago,” he said.

Overstreet said the most immediate culprit in the diesel cost spike is an explosion that crippled production in an Alberta refinery. Once that’s back on line, and once refineries switch over to normal spring production, he anticipates prices easing somewhat.

“That doesn’t mean the prices aren’t going to be high, because they’re higher everywhere in the country, and I anticipate that they will continue to be high, at least for the short term,” he said.

Overstreet said that crude oil prices, now at $50 a barrel and more, are the main driver of high fuel prices, both for diesel and gasoline. At this time last year, diesel prices were about 82 cents a gallon less than they are now.

http://www.kpbx.org/news/mar05/Diesel%20prices.htm