Fuel price

[The Crofter]

Just watched quentin thingy on ITV talking about the possibility of a £5 gallon in the summer. Well we currently pay £1.18/litre which by my calculation is £5.35 / gall.....

[Moglet]

Better get used to it, peeps. It's gonna get worse and never really get better. Welcome to the world of Peak Oil!

[prospero]

When I passed my test it was 75p a gallon.

Maybe I shouldn't ponce about with a 4ltrV8.

[WelshFramer]

When I passed my test it was 75p a gallon.

Maybe I shouldn't ponce about with a 4ltrV8.

4s 11d a gallon when I passed. We were horrified when it went up to 5s a gallon.

I'm sitting here wondering whether to go to the supermarket for some oven chips for my dinner - it's a 30-mile round trip so the petrol will cost a lot more than the chips.

[The Crofter]

200 mile round trip to Tesco for me....

Luckily the local shop sells a kit of oil and potatoes so I can make my own.

[Moglet]

The day might not be that far away when growing yer own spuds will be far more cost effective, Mike!

Good to see good ol' imperial currency again. Truth to tell, I still convert back to it (PITA having to do the Euro conversion as well, these days... )

It's scary to think how much currency has devalued since the days of Real Money. When decimalisation came in, a Kit Kat was 6d / 2½p. Nowadays, a Kit Kat wil set you back roughly 12/- !!!!!

--- Edit: That's a 2400% difference!

God be with the days when having half-a-crown made one feel rather flush; and when being the proud posessor of a ten bob note meant that you had loadsamoney!!

[Bill Henry]

… we currently pay £1.18/litre which by my calculation is £5.35 / gall.....

WOW!

By my calculations (converting Imperial to U.S. gallons) and the current exchange rate we are only paying the equivalent of £1.83 / gallon ($U.S ~ $3.70).

… and, we’re still bitc*ing over here.

[The Crofter]

Yep, I always found it a little funny when an American moans about the price of fuel. It is a shame that diesel engines and lower capacities are a relatively modern concept to the American way of life. No offence but if the love of big block motors had been reigned in say 20 years ago then the current fuel crisis may not hurt so much. Having said that I know that things are changing. Just a shame that the larger vehicles can still hide behind a classification that encourages ownership.

[Moglet]

... if the love of big block motors had been reigned in say 20 years ago then the current fuel crisis may not hurt so much...

Call me a cynic, but I reckon that it wouldn't make much of a difference, given the demand from China.

[The Crofter]

Had America reduced its energy consumption and emmisions then I feel it would have had more power to influence the growth of China. It is a question of pots & kettles. I think that China's growth will hit a natural limit as the world cannot supply sufficient resources to feed this black hole. Whether this leads to the next world war remains to be seen !!.

[georgeh]

Bill

We are paying approx 5 dollars (US) per gallon alone in Tax for petrol here, we also pay VAT on the cost of the petrol plus the duty, i.e. we are paying tax on tax.

[kev@frames]

It is noticeable in rural areas like ours, where people seem to have one car per working member of the family out of necessity, often a long commute, and tend to make up with it by driving three old bangers per householdinstead of one new car.

It still comes as a surprise to me when I cross the Tamar to see almost everybody in new cars, then get back home and find myself surrounded by sierras and mondeo's with the wings hanging off, and F reg rovers , and 20 year old land rovers.

There used to be a Jethro saying: "Whats on the Cornish registration plate? Anything earlier than D"

[Not your average framer]

I may be risking showing my age here, but I can remember when petrol was 1s 3d per gallon and there were brands of petrol such as Regent, Blue Star, Mobil and Cleveland.

At the time my father had a Canadian ford Y-type shooting-brake with and 6.5 litre engine, which for some strange reason had 6 volt electrics and if it didn't start first time the battery got flattened and had to be started with a crank handle. Anyone remember crank handles?

If the weather was nice, we used to go down to Littlehampton in Sussex(Roboframer's territory) and on hot days it was a common sight to see cars overheating at the side of the road going up Bury hill. For those who know that hill in those days the road was much narrower, steeper and a real test for some cars of the time.

There were no seat belts, the indicators fliped out of the side of the car, none our our early cars needed an ignition key, you just had an ignition switch and a starter switch, there was no national speed limit and we used to regularly go over 100 miles an hour, which was perfectly legal then.

My father was convinced that the car would go faster on some brands of petrol that on others. When they opened the M1 we drove all the way to north London just to so what it was like and it was an almost empty road in those days.

As time went on Esso told us to put a tiger in our tank (their sales slogon) and they gave away funny little cloth things they called Tiger's Tails. These were like thin orange and black socks with two black tapes for you to tie onto your car. By this time I was a teenager and no Mod's Lambretta was complete without it's Tiger Tails. Who remembers Tiger Tails?

I think I must be getting old.

[Bill Henry]

No offence but if the love of big block motors had been reigned in say 20 years ago then the current fuel crisis may not hurt so much. Having said that I know that things are changing. Just a shame that the larger vehicles can still hide behind a classification that encourages ownership.

No offense taken at all. The American car manufacturers are the most myopic corporations in the world, I betcha. When the gasoline crunch came in the ‘70’s, they still tooled large gas guzzlers. Meanwhile, the Japanese engineered their cars for efficiency.

Now, sales of foreign cars in the U.S. outstrip those of Ford and Chevrolet, I think. The major manufacturers are lamenting that they lost millions of dollars last year. Big Surprise!

I drive a 2007, Toyota Yaris which gets 41 mpg (~ 50 mpg Imperial). And, there are still imbeciles who wait for months to buy a behemoth that gets 15 mpg. Go figure.

One of the reasons that diesel engines don’t sell well over here is the fact that the weather can get so cold that the fuel congeals. But, those owners who do have diesel are getting into the “bio-fuel” concept. By getting free, used cooking oil from restaurants, filtering the bits of charred cod and potatoes out of it, they can run their automobiles very efficiently with only a minor modification to the engine.

Their exhaust smells like a fish and chips take out, but what the heck?

[The Crofter]

The biofuel movement is gaining pace here as well but the UK's fish & chip shops can only provide a fraction of what is needed and it will remain a niche market. Also production of bio fuels (rape) is competing for the same space as food which is not great news. We have a wheat shortage at present so uk farmers are happy to grow a profitable crop. I would not mind betting that wheat brings a better return than bio fuel.

I was appalled at the stunt pulled by Branson regarding the jet flight using bio fuel. Not sure how much land is needed to produce 10,000 gallons (ish) but it's going to be a lot.

There are emerging technologies that may end up solving a lot of the problems but they are still a way off. To my mind using algae to crerate fuel could be a winner.

[tightmitre]

Yet another half-hearted attempt by the government to get rid of the Chelsea tractors. £950 aint gonna stop anyone buying one, just line the treasury coffers a little more. It sure wont go on environmental projects and it sure wont stop them getting used for the school run and the trip to Sainsbury. I bet the big 4x4 dealerships are laughing up thier sleeves again.

The only people who will feel the pinch are the people who really need these vehicles, like Pat ( The Crofter). I've been up to his part of the country many times and it sure can be grim in the Winter. It'll be the same with thier attempt to price the binge drinkers into sobriety. Supposing they added £7 extra tax to a bottle of vodka which would double the price, I don't think it would stop anyone buying it. Just more cash for the treasury and the same problems would still be there. I suppose they might introduce some half baked drink awareness program with all the cash they would rake in.

Here endeth my rant for the day.
Just going to have a beer and a Highland Park. Mmmmm.
Should manage to get round to cleaning out the Morso shavings from the back of the 4x4 tomorrow.

[kev@frames]

big 4WDs: Used prices seem to have dropped so low they are almost giving some away- you can get a lot for your money, its tempting.....

[realhotglass]

Áine mentioned it . . . Peak Oil.

I only discovered the term and meaning in an ABC doco about 18 months ago.
I was interested enough to go and find out more.

For anyone not aware of this theory (and I do believe it is coming upon the world fast) Google it . . . what you'll find can be slightly frightening in its message, but better to be aware, and prepare somewhat, than to have the ol' head in the sand.

There are websites that are very 'doom and gloom' about it, some middle of the road (no pun intended), others debunk it, but there are many nights of interesting reading to get info to make your own decision about it.

How many here have heard about it ?
How many think it is coming, and how far off ?
How many think humans can find other sources of energy (to mention only one part of the oil chain) to come close to matching the good times we've had so far with oil ?

For interests sake, we are now paying about AUD$1.45 / litre here (ranges from 1.37 to 1.48, we have a discounting cycle), which is ~ GBP 0.671 / lt or GBP 3.05142 / UK gallon . . . US$5.16 / US gallon.

Remember when calculating, US and UK gallons are different, at least according to this page . . . http://www.onlineconversion.com/volume.htm
I use this page for currency conversion . . . http://www.xe.com/ucc/

I think we (the world market in general) still have it pretty good now.

Opec are controlling supply, demand, and pricing to milk the world while it can . . . I hate seeing those Dubai pics showing their extravagance.
All built our the worlds manipulation, and while a good part of the world starves or has a miserably poor quality of life.

Ps. Good on you Bill for taking the initiative in changing your vehicle habits too.

Oh, and there is also a great chance of 'Peak Food' in coming years . . . Bio fuels from grains might be very much more needed for this purpose in years to come, so don't hold out much hope for this as a long term alternative to fossil fuel.

[georgeh]

Yes I have heard about it
It certainly is coming.
As to when, probably only the oil companies and governments know and there's no way we will get to find out until they want us to know.

With our level of technology there must already exist more than one viable alternative, when the oil runs out I'm sure that the means of controlling and developing it will be found and I'm sure the UK government will find ways of taxing it to the hilt.

I think the food situation is more worrying and the same theory must also apply to the water supply.

Re. the US gallon being different, up until the 19th century the UK had 3 different measures of the gallon, Ale, wine and corn, the US decided to go with the wine gallon, hence the difference.

[WelshFramer]

200 mile round trip to Tesco for me....

Well, that's one distinct advantage of living where you do.