Price collapse or 5 dollar gas…

We finally started seeing gas prices below $3 here about a week ago. 10/13, we paid $2.96/gal in Orlando, and that was at least 20 cents cheaper than any place I saw between there and Gainesville. I had been happy to pay only $3.40 a few days earlier in Gainesville. Taxes in Alachua county are a bit high, and the southeast is just recovering from a gas shortage, if you can believe that, LOL. Some places in GA ran completely out of gas only a few weeks ago.

Leah Robertson said:
Here in NM, gas prices are hovering around the $2.50 mark and it's nice to once again have the option of filling up a whole tank of gas without twitching upon receiving the total price numbers of DOOM on the receipt.
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Actually, I think it's just nice to be able to fill up once again without having to run my card more than once. Most of the stations here have charge limits of $50 or $75. Even at $75 I couldn't fill an empty tank on one charge/debit.

I don't think prices will rise quickly and may even continue to fall a bit, even with cutbacks in production. Much of the gasoline supply is more directly connected to refinery output. Our refineries can only produce so much at a time, and this output has been severely limited for the last few years due to repairs, upgrades, and natural disaster losses. Also, since oil is traded in US dollars, the recovery of our currency against foreign currencies has a dramatic effect on oil pricing. Essentially, our dollar today should theoretically buy more oil even if the computed supply "value" and speculated value were to remain unchanged.

It's all great for state-side chasers - less expensive gasoline; not so great for those of you traveling here from outside the US - it's gonna cost more with the exchange rate just to get here.
 
Has anyone looked into this? It's a system where you buy as much gas as you want at todays price, and you pay that price even if prices at the pump go up...

http://inventorspot.com/articles/buy_gas_now_and_pay_less_later_15277

Put in $1000 right now at $2.50/gal and get 400 gallons of gas. Gas goes up to $4/gal and you only get 250 gallons for $1000. There could be big savings in this as long as prices don't drop too much more and eventually rebound.
 
Paul Austin said:
It's all great for state-side chasers - less expensive gasoline; not so great for those of you traveling here from outside the US - it's gonna cost more with the exchange rate just to get here.
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That's right, Paul.
In may, one US $ cost 4,75 danish kroners, and by now it's at 5,91 danish kroners - a rise of about 20% - and its most likely going to rise further.
I just hope the gas prizes stay as low as they are now until next summer, so I can benefit from that on my next chase in may 2009.

Speaking af gas prizes : In Denmark one liter of gas typically costs about $2, so paying $3-$4 a gallon is actually a good deal for a dane...:)
 
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Tucson, and Az in general, are usually pretty well off. A big pipeline that connects gulf refineries to much of the SW passes through town so distribution costs are low. For a week or two this summer, we enjoyed the lowest prices in the country.

Yet.... We're still stuck in the 2.70s for some reason. Our state taxes haven't changed, consumption is down, so what gives? It's clear that the cartel manages prices nationwide, and it's our turn to get screwed. :mad:

Guess I can't complain too loudly. Winter heating costs down here are non existent - no need to buy thousands of $ of heating oil. With more work on my driving technique, I'm up to 37+ MPG in my old Honda.
 
Quoted from an earlier post: "Hopefully we can get the lawmakers to drill domestically so we can have a sustained oil collapse during the recovery in a year or two."

We have the technology now to turn anything into oil - that includes chicken waste, plastic, garbage, even radioactive waste. There are at least two plants in operation now in the USA that use this technology, which modifies current oil refinery processes to utilize water during the refining procedures. Feel free to do a web search under "anything into oil" and several articles will come up regarding this. This is an environmental solution that recycles and solves some of the oil problem. In addition, the technology exists for modifying our cars to get more mileage as well as convert them into plug -in electrics as well as using vegetable oil for diesel run cars. All of these are environmentally friendly and do not trash our land like drilling and/or shale oil, the latter of which was proven to be wasteful and destructive back in the 1970's when it was first experimented with.

My thought is that the price of gas will again rise, shortly after the start of the new year, unless the demand is so low due to the world wide economy that this would be difficult to pull off.
 
After a very painful spring and summer of $50 to $58 fillups for my Forester, it was extremely refreshing to only pay $37.55 to fill my tank with 14 gallons at $2.61 a gallon in Longmont last night :D
I have seen gas as low as $2.33 a gallon being advertised in the Denver Metro area, with the lowest prices in the northwestern suburbs, i.e. Arvada, Wheat Ridge, Westminster etc. and as high as $2.99 a gallon in the Cherry Creek area in southeast Denver, which is, of course, where I live. So I drive across town whenever I need to fill up my tank. It's worth driving the extra 5 or 10 miles to fill up for 30 to 70 cents less per gallon.

I just hope and pray that these gas prices continue to stay reasonably low through next chase season, as it would make chasing a much more affordable proposition and drastically increase the number of chases we can go on. A win win for all involved, without a doubt.
And given the current economic conditions, I think it would be reasonable to say that there is a very strong possibility we will only be paying $2.00 to $2.50 for gas this upcoming season.

I and my wallet could definitely handle that.
 
Prices here in Oklahoma are down to $2.10 a gallon. With the expected continued free-fall of oil prices I believe its possible we could see $1.75 maybe even @1.50 prices before this thing levels off. I know OPEC has decided to cut production, but that doesn't necessarily mean gas prices will turn around and go up right away. I think the struggling economy (now a worldwide issue) has a lot to do with dropping oil prices. Of course, it will likely rebound by chase season, and we will be paying more than we are now. Its nice to see a break for once. I sure do miss $0.87 a gallon when I started chasing in 97'.
 
There is one thing we chasers should be thankful for. for the most part the cheapest gas in the country usually can be found in the Plains, which is where most of us do the majority of our chasing. Thank God tornado alley isnt in the northeast or CA!
 
Mark Farnik said:
I just hope and pray that these gas prices continue to stay reasonably low through next chase season
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I hope so too, but we all know it's just a pipe dream. Gas always gets cheaper during fall and winter, and then picks back up during the spring and summer months. Obviously I'm no expert, but I can almost guarantee gas will not be below 3.50 come May. I sure hope I'm wrong.
 
Gas is now as low as 2.06 here in Amarillo. I paid 2.17 this morning. I was on empty and it cost a grand total of 35.55 to fill my tank up. Man, I wish this would last through spring, but it won't.
 
As soon as this new free fall got established, what's the first thing you heard from OPEC? "We're cutting production."

OPEC making moves to control the price of gas isn't "the market" or "the economy" or "supply and demand"....it's simply us getting the shaft because they can get away with it. That's why I've never understood the "analysts" on ST who've always defended the price of gas.

The fall of gas prices, not the rise, is economy-based. Anyone else still not convinced the surge in fuel prices the past few years is directly related to the current state of the economy? I understand that people who spend money they don't have is much to do with it as well, but people have always done that (it's called "credit"). The distribution industry taking the initial hit (from OPEC gouging) started the domino chain. If your distribution cost doubles or triples, then you raise prices. Then consumers buy less, or switch brands, or go without, because they're basically working to pay for gas to get to work. Then your companies who are spending out the butt to pay for distro aren't seeing the return because Joe Consumer is sitting at home because all his shopping money is sitting in his gas tank. So nobody's buying, nobody's making money, and eventually, nobody wants that precious fuel as much.

So then OPEC must drop the price to increase demand = the economy. Once the demand is back up, and things are working well enough on both sides, they decide to get greedy again, cut production (manipulation), and price gouge = OPEC screwing us.

Prices have been over a dollar less then they were six months ago for the better part of a month, and the world isn't dying, OPEC isn't filing bankruptcy, there's no armageddon, and most importantly...gas is no less a commodity now than it was six months ago. It works fine, for everybody, at $2/gallon. OPEC greed makes it $3.50/4 per gallon, nothing more.
 
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Gas is as low as 2.11 here in Canton. Some parts of Ohio have already dropped below 2 a gallon. The prices will probably continue to be low through the next season. Because the market works, we've seen a transition to people buying better MPG vehicles by the hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, so when the next economic boom starts somtime between 4th quarter of next year and 2011 (supposing the next tax boom doesnt stop it), we may not see the 4 dollar gas come up as quickly. However, we will see it again. As long as we're not getting more supplies of oil on the market, the price will soar and the price of gas will soar with it.

Here's a graph showing what goes into a gallon of gas, when it comes to price.
http://supportanalytics.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/gascomponents.jpg
 
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