Just Why is Diesel Fuel so Expensive???

LibertyFever · **Posted:** Fri Mar 26, 2010 6:55 am

I'm not that old....okay, maybe I am, but I can remember when diesel fuel was much cheaper than gas. Now they're almost equal or diesel is sometimes more expensive.

I'm not a chemist but I have the impression that gas is more refined than diesel therefore should cost less. Is it a matter of supply & demand? Because there are more diesel vehicles on the road the oil companies think they can charge more?

Also is it true that diesel fuel isn't all that much different than household heating fuel?

I've visited Europe and have admired the amount of diesel vehicles there. It was neat to see the diesel Wrangler & Cherokee's (AKA Liberty).

ATXKJ · **Posted:** Fri Mar 26, 2010 7:31 am

Gasoline is in higher demand than diesel
When you refine crude oil into gasoline - diesel is one of the byproducts.
the ratio tends to be fixed by the raw material - a refinery can tweak it - but it takes extra processing.

Diesel used to be cheaper than regular -
however the current prices are blamed on the Ultra Low Sulfur requirement that takes extra processing.

The price changes didn't match that timeline - they were about 6 months to a year before ULSD.

Silverdiesel · **Posted:** Fri Mar 26, 2010 11:02 am

I remember D2 being 1/2 the cost of RUG back in the the day but I have had a driver's license since the 60's!
I read about a huge refinery designed to produce D2 for the world market in India opening in 2008 to meet the demand of the emerging economies in the Far East but would have a profound impact on world pricing. Coupled with the fact that quite a few domestic refineries were "retooling" to produce more diesel actually made pricing fall under RUG last year. At least out West. Now D2 hovers just over the price of RUG but never goes over the pricing of Premium unleaded.
Pricing is artificial however as here in Phoenix I can see upwards of 25-30% price differences going from station to station for D2 while Unleaded just changes a penny or two.
At least it it not way higher like in the mid 2000's where D2 was 20% higher than Premium! When I first bought the Jeep my wife yelled at me "are you crazy- may as well gotten a Land Rover and save cause Super Unleaded is cheaper!"
As you know even at 40% higher pricing diesel is still a better value for the economy, the enviorment and your wallet.

Roland

warp2diesel · **Posted:** Sat Mar 27, 2010 8:02 pm

Due to the state of the economy (unemployed people drive less) in key parts of the country there is a slight glut of Gasoline compared to diesel. Since most if not all of the OTR Trucks use diesel, the demand for diesel is more steady.
Back in the 70's the big Energy Crysis where there were long gas lines that backed up down the street, was only a two percent shortage of supply. When ever the economy fully recovers perhaps after the 2012 election, Gasoline prices should start to be slightly higher than diesel again.

CRD Joe · **Posted:** Tue Apr 06, 2010 11:15 pm

In the peoples republic of Warshington its more expensive because of higher road taxes.

boilermaker2 · **Posted:** Fri Aug 27, 2010 1:36 pm

We use more gasoline. Europe uses more diesel. Our excess distallate gets shipped to Europe and their gasoline comes here. Both continents get gouged.
:5SHOTS:

audiboy86 · **Posted:** Fri Aug 27, 2010 3:00 pm

Diesel is still just a by-product yes some of it does still has to be produced separately but atleast 75% is still a byproduct. I mean from station to station here it can be as much as a 5 cent variance and with that quality varies majorly. I have also ran quite a bit of offroad in my rig from time to time and at certain places it is as much as regular. So i think the government and a oil company are giving us the consumer the screws :furious:

when it comes to this.

67Customs · **Posted:** Fri Aug 27, 2010 3:22 pm

When the gas crisis started hitting three or so years ago, people started driving diesel because it was cheaper. All of a sudden, diesel prices jumped above gas. It wasn't a small jump either. I don't care what they say about economic BS (I've studied it), they simply raised the price so people would keep buying gasoline and if people still wanted to switch to diesel, they would still be making bank on it as well. There is no economic answer for that large of a jump in price.

jnaut · **Posted:** Fri Aug 27, 2010 7:39 pm

My Jeep runs on the tears of environmentalists. They're very cheap, because they're so plentiful.

audiboy86 · **Posted:** Sat Aug 28, 2010 12:08 am

jnaut wrote:

My Jeep runs on the tears of environmentalists. They're very cheap, because they're so plentiful.

If only the whole world could do this then our fuel crisis would be solved until the government decided to somehow tax those to.

grsjax · **Joined:** Sun Oct 03, 2010 7:26 pm **Posts:** 61

In most cases it is the taxes put on by the state that make diesel more expensive than gasoline. In some states it is still cheaper but don't expect that to remain the case. States see diesel as a money maker as all the over the road truckers need it.

Just Why is Diesel Fuel so Expensive???

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