US oil, gas boom

[Spang]

What kind of car do I own? This is news to me.

[Aslanna]

If there is a boom why am I paying $3.90 a gallon!

[Winnow]

If there is a boom why am I paying $3.90 a gallon!

It's more like 3.49 in AZ!

[Aslanna]

Maybe for now. It will go up. Probably soon!

[Boogahz]

$3.21, and that was at a station along a major highway which tends to be higher

[Funkmasterr]

~4.00 here. For 91+ octane anyhow, no idea what the cheap crap is.

[Spang]

Chances are you've put the "cheap crap" in your gas tank unknowingly.

[Aabidano]

~4.00 here. For 91+ octane anyhow, no idea what the cheap crap is.

If your engine doesn't ping or get noticeably worse mileage with cheap gas you're wasting money on premium, and may damage the engine over time.

$3.30 here, usually higher than most of the country.

[Leonaerd]

I'm paying a little over $4.00 for premium.

Audi. Never again.

[Funkmasterr]

All of my cars have suggested using it, and while I'm well aware it's unnecessary, it's better for the engine over time.

My motorcycle I absolutely won't put anything other than premium in, and I get non oxygenated gas if there's a place nearby that has it when I need to fill up.

[Aabidano]

it's better for the engine over time.

Higher octane simply means it's less explosive and generally burns slower. It isn't better or worse, that's just advertising. If you have high(er) compression, not as uncommon as it was a few years ago there's no issue with it. If you don't have higher compression or a long stroke (unusual in cars\motorcycles) there isn't always enough time\oxygen to burn the slower burning premium fuel and you can end up with gunked up cylinder heads and valves.

Not using it when you need it means the computer has to retard the timing, etc... to prevent knocking and mileage/power decrease. And again, you get gunked up cylinders & valves.

[Winnow]

I missed the old leaded gas days. I used to fill up the '67 Mustang with it!

[Aslanna]

Yeah damn that EPA and clean air. Who needs it!

[Aabidano]

Look on the bright side Winnow, the contamination from the fuel additives will live on for thousands of years as a keepsake.

(They kept using tetra-ethyl lead years after they knew it was incredibly toxic and had alternatives as it was a cheap way to boost octane. Thanks Wall St.!)

neurologists have speculated that the lead phaseout may have caused average IQ levels to rise by several points in the US (by reducing cumulative brain damage throughout the population, especially in the young).

It's still used in racing fuel, explains the mentality of NASCAR fans?

[Leonaerd]

U.S. oil boom leaves OPEC sidelined from demand growth

Say what you will about fracking, clean energy, and veganism. In a world of fiat currency, this is an absolutely fucking enormously amazing, HOPEFUL situation for America.

The United States will overtake Russia as the world's largest non-OPEC producer as early as 2015, the IEA said.

[Show]

[Spang]

[Winnow]

Report: U.S. oil surge transforming markets, undercutting OPEC

By Patrice Hill

The Washington Times

Tuesday, May 14, 2013

The rapid growth of U.S. oil production is transforming global markets and easing supplies just as China and the rest of the developing world move to overtake the U.S. and the developed world for the first time in the consumption of oil, the International Energy Agency reported Tuesday.

The shale oil revolution in the U.S. heartland will cause a surge in oil production of 3.9 million barrels a day in the next five years, the IEA said, far exceeding the growth of OPEC and other oil suppliers, eliminating the need for Middle Eastern imports in the U.S. and causing other cascading effects.

“North America has set off a supply shock that is sending ripples throughout the world,” said IEA Executive Director Maria van der Hoeven. “The good news is that this is helping to ease a market that was relatively tight for several years.”

Besides displacing Middle Eastern oil imports so they can be redirected toward Asia, which is the fastest growing center of demand, the hydraulic fracturing — or “fracking” — technologies used to release the oil from shale rock in the U.S. have the potential to transform the way oil is produced around the world and could lead to a major reassessment of the world’s oil resources, she said.

The growth of oil supply from the U.S. and Canada, which is ratcheting up development of its vast Alberta oil sands, couldn’t come at a better time as the developing world is set to surpass the developed world in the consumption of oil for the first time this quarter, the agency said.

China has been the biggest and most dramatic source of new demand for oil in the last 15 years, but the use of oil is also growing briskly in the rest of Asia, the Middle East and Africa, areas which are enjoying robust economic growth. At one time only a decade or so ago, the U.S., Europe and Japan were the dominant sources of world oil demand.

Even as supplies surge in North America, production by the OPEC group of oil producers has grown only weakly, hobbled by unrest in the Middle East and North Africa stemming from the Arab Spring uprisings, the agency said. Iraq is leading the growth in OPEC production, but it continues to encounter obstacles that slow the development of its vast oil reserves.

Yeah baby...yeah!

[Spang]

Major earthquakes thousands of miles away can trigger reflex quakes in areas where fluids have been injected into the ground from fracking and other industrial operations, according to a study published in the journal Science on Thursday.

More

[Leonaerd]

It's the earth's fault!

But that is shitty, if true. Shittier if there's no better method of waste disposal.