Go read the Snopes article.


Oil is alot more complicated than that. A barrel of oil may change hands numerous times between the time it's pumped out of the ground and when it's finally purchased by the end user. Just because BP pumped it, they may likely not retail it. Every oil company has a trading department. They buy and sell oil every day. They may have short-term supply issues one way or another that require them to sell crude they don't have capacity to refine or they may buy it to keep a refinery processing. They may make a decision that it's more profitable to sell that tanker-ship load that's halfway through its trip to another oil company than it is to process and retail it themselves- usually in a situation where wholesale costs have changed.

Remember, the oil companies live in the same world we do. Today's price of oil is today only. They may pump millions barrels today with the market at $90 but they can't deliver it to you today. They need to move it to a port processing facility, load it onto a tanker, ship it across the globe, unload it, pipeline it a thousand miles and refine it. If the market moves from $90 to $70 during that span, they lose $20 million (paper loss) on that million-barrel load.

OK....I have over 400 addy's in my folder......everyone in the addy book will get this....let hope it works.......I still think people buy based on price.......even a few cents on a gallon less dumb azzes will drive an extra 5 five miles to save 40 cents on a fill up :angry-smiley-038:

We use hess, with the hess credit card you get 10% for 1st 90 days, then 5% off there after.
Dean

I wonder what the stats are today on oil imports?
The email and the Snopes article both seem at least 5 years old.

Hey, let's all just switch to E85. It's $.50 a gal cheaper anyway.:cool:

Maybe cheaper but that's going to be reflected in your gas mileage even more. Ethanol has substantially less BTU count than gasoline.

Plus, if you peel away the government subsidies, then look at the amount of production needed to actually make a real dent in petro-imports, ethanol then truly appears for what it really is- a diversion.

Chris,
That's my understanding also, E85 produces less BTU's, and is a MAJOR Water attractor, not too good for boating, i would think.
Dean

Ethanol has about half of the heat value of gasoline. It gets into some complicated chemistry but about half of the methyl alcohol molecule isn't combustible.

At the same time, alcohol has a significantly higher octane and it's better at remaining in a vaporized state so it burns better, so there's not a real-world 50% loss in power.

You're right- ethanol is a water sponge. Drygas is 100% alcohol- its intended use is to pull water from gasoline and pass it through the combustion process. With EPA mandated systems, the delivery & storage of fuels is much better- it's tough to get water into them- but it can happen. But it can happen with gas too and without the ethanol, water in gas is really bad. I have heard of boats like Skaters having fuel tank problems attributed to alcohol.

Unless your marina has a CAM 2 pump, or you truck in race gas, alcohol is just a reality of boating.

I've had to run BP (It's still British Petroleum, no matter how much they'd like to get away from it) in my Harley a few times out on the road and it runs like crap! Rough idle, lots more engine vibration at speed, etc. Most, if not all, of the BP dealers in my area are selling the 10% ethanol blend.

Where you buy your gas has little to do with who refined it. BP and everyone else buy and sell their refined product on the open market.

Ethanol is used primarily for oxygenation under EPA mandate. It replaced MTBE when its use was restricted. In most populated areas the blend can vary county-to-county.