Re: Increasing Fuel Prices
I am going to work hard to keep this thread open. This may backfire, but help me here OK . . .
Taxes make up a big chunk of the fuel price.
Almost everywhere but in the US.
Enjoy it while you can....up north here we are over $5/gallon. Could be worse tho'....check out the European prices.
"Street" price here [Italy] is roughly $8.35 a gallon.
This is what will happen if government tries to control prices instead of the free market.....even though prices are higher right now it is still cheaper than most of the rest of world
European prices don't make me feel better for some reason LOL. I think you pay a lot more taxes than we do?
Blue is the fuel portion of fuel price and the red is taxes. This is an Aussie chart in Aussie Dollars per liter. It doesn't matter what currency or volume unit, the ratio is the same. This is June 2010.
If you look at the red line down the middle, that is the median price for the commodity after it is refined. Yes, different crude quality and different fuel specs make the refining and commodity price a little fluid, but you can see it is pretty close worldwide. The only real difference in fuel price is taxes and it proves that market forces (including speculation) are in place and they affect us all equally.
We need research into alternative fuels quickly or the economy will grind to a halt and all our lifestyles will be changed. Forget the ethanol crapola. Right now we are the mercy of the crisis of the month or the "growing" world economy. If we stay on this path then we are doomed. Fossil fuels will run out no matter what in 60 years or so anyway..
Ya I want this thread to stay away from politics too. That is what keeps us in this mess. We need alternative fuels that are NOT related to food production. WE need them now.
"Research" is why politics is always involved with Alternate Fuels. Research = grants, grants = Government. Leave it to the market forces themselves and you'll get exactly what you want. There are no less costly "alternate" fuels for vehicles other than Natural Gas and in some cases Propane, and I guess Ethanol depending on how you add it up. That's it. If you all know of something else, let me know because I'll need to look for a new job . . .
I suggest if we want to get into the specifics of Ethanol or Natural Gas or any other alternative, that we open a thread in Non-Boating Technical to deal with that.
