A discussion on one of the news networks was on the price of gas. A guy comes up and says if you want to cut the price of gas tomorrow, have the refineries all make the same gas. There's a specific blend for the northeast, one for the south, etc. etc.
What?
Eliminating the various blends will drop production costs.
Have you heard of this?
Dan
I have known for some time that there are different blends for different regions and seasons. They blend the fuel at the refinery so they can produce gasoline at the lowest possible quality and cost that will function in a given area for a given month. They also blend fuel at the import tank farms along the coast. Blending hydrocarbons is a mature technology and the oil companies are pretty good at it. They do not produce "better" or more expensive gasoline then required.
Although it might require more imports one way the country could reduce overall fuel costs is to eliminate the Gasohol program. It cost far more in material and energy (natural gas) to produce a gallon of 15% ethanol fuel than the straight gasoline. A gallon of 85% is even more expensive. This program was not about pollution control or reducing imports but was designed to transfer money from the coasts to the farming areas in mid country. Besides burning food corn, even animal food corn, for fuel is a patent absurdity.
The different blend are made toward the end of the supply chain. The refinery sends a "generic" formula to local distributors who make the blends.
If everyone used the same blend it would probably save some money just from the "economy of scale" but I don't think it would be that much.
The only way you are going to really cut the price of gas is to halt all the commodity market speculation in oil futures.
Hal wrote: The only way you are going to really cut the price of gas is to halt all the commodity market speculation in oil futures.
I'm not sure about that. There is only a finite amount of oil in the ground and we've already taken out the best and easist to get to oil. We are now left with lower quality and harder to recover oil. Oil prices will keep going up as there is a greater worldwide demand and relatively stagnant (soon to be shrinking) supplies.
I marvel at all the plastic things we use on a daily basis like those grocery sacks. They are mostly one-time use and throw away items. I can imagine a time 50 years from now that people will wonder what in the world we were doing using a precious resource like oil to make trash. The age of oil will not last forever.
In reply to T.J.:
doesnt help cost or supply when we wont allow oil companies to remove known oil...
i was hoping to read about unblending the alcohol content back out to G100.
I also think that there is waaay too much plastic trash. I work at a store that sells alot of cheap plactic things, and most of them are sent from other countries and of such poor quality half of them are already broken when you open the box.
Yeah, and people are also buying so much stuff they don't need. Imagine how much less pollution there would be if we could eliminated that kind of waste. 
Here in Michigan we are required by our federal overlords to use a winter and a summer blend. We just switched to the summer fuel and had prices jump 40 cents per gallon over the course of a weekend.
nderwater wrote: Yeah, and people are also buying so much stuff they don't need. Imagine how much less pollution there would be if we could eliminated that kind of waste.
Like driving around in parking lots and racetracks with expensive, oil/water intensive produced tires? An engine burning $10/qt synthetic and $100/set brake pads.
You want the correct blend of gas. If you can manage to drive from, say, below zero to 80* on one tank of fuel, you will find some interesting starting issues next morning.
In reply to 914Driver:
Not only have I heard about it, I'm fully aware of it.
Can't speak one word about the economics, but...
In terms of emissions, I'm very confident that if we reduce the number of blends that are available around the country, particulary protecting for blends and temperature ranges, the overall vehicle emissions would be reduced AND cars would drive better.
I'm aware of well over 10 different gas blends that have to be dealt with that are different enough that they have to be proven.
'braden- the whole winter/summer blend thing is very much required. Winter fuel evaporates at a lower temps, which first of all makes it possible to start your car below 20F, and because of that, really does decrease emissions. It's a very good thing.
But if you used the same fuel in the summer, especially on a 90 deg day after you've driven around and had your car off for 10-30 min, you car probably would not start due to big bubles in the fuel rail.
Some blending is required due to conditions. Others, I don't think so, so much.
The reason areas are allowed to modify their blend- older cars that have little emissions hardware- you can very much locally impact emissions by custom blending the fuel. So non-attainment areas are allowed to use that as a "tool". Even if it's not so effective anymore.
So, in the end, if everyone in the country was required to use the same E10 that California mandates, air quality would get better. (same if it was ALL E0 or E20- as long as it's the same)
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