Grumpy old buggers thread

[V8Ian]

Terminal Gate Prices | Australian Institute of Petroleum

TGP is, as described in the name, the price at the gate, excluding transport and any discounts.
Prices can be manipulated by various means, including delaying delivery, prior to an impending price increase.

[JDNSW]

We export about the same amount of crude that we import back as fuel. Of cause it all doesn't make petrol and diesel. about 80% of imports are diesel obviously for transport and mining. Bob Hawkes parity pricing didn't help as it sent local crude up in price as well as retail prices. You may remember the so called pay off that no one would pay more than 1 cent a litre extra in country areas.

The point is that Australian oil production is far less than the amount of oil Australia produces. Fifty years ago Australia was self sufficient in oil, and refined virtually all of it onshore. Since then demand for oil in Australia has increased, mainly due to population growth, but also due to much rail transport being replaced by road and air transport, far outweighing improvements in fuel economy, and improvements like B-doubles. And also Australians are far more mobile than they were fifty years ago, and much less likely to use public transport.

At the same time, production has decreased from the depletion of the giant fields discovered in the 1960s and 1970s. New discoveries to replace these have been relatively small, and oil exploration in Australia has dropped to almost nothing, thanks to both poor results and community opposition and sovereign risk.

Meanwhile, the economics of existing refineries has become problematic, mainly because of the competition from more modern, much larger refineries such as those in Singapore, and the impossibility of enlarging the existing Australian refineries because they are now in a built up area that has grown up around them since they were built up to a hundred years ago.

[Tins]

Every time I’ve been up there fuels been cheaper than below the border.

You are also welcome in Melbourne anytime.

[Tins]

Since most of Australia's fuel supply come from crude traded on the world market .....

That's the kicker. We pay world parity, regardless of where the stuff come from. If ( when ) Alberta leaves Canada that may well change. I don't mean we will cease to pay parity, I mean that the ME may no longer be the arbiter.

[Tins]

but also due to much rail transport being replaced by road and air transport,

Trouble here is that the trains don't go where the freight is needed, and freight is often too time sensitive to be parked in a siding somewhere. And even if our antique rail system was brought into the current century, which would require a leap of about 150 years, the issues remain the same. Aus is far too scattered, and nobody wants train tracks in their main street. A sight not uncommon in the US, where road freight is king. Mobs like SCT can make intercapital rail freight work, on a small scale, but still rely heavily on trucks.

[JDNSW]

I was thinking mainly of passenger transport. A large proportion of our fuel is used in passenger journeys in cars that really would be better in trains, trams or buses rather than cars.

I agree that a lot of freight transport is not suited to rail, but it is difficult to see why bulk freight should not be - but spending money on rail does not win votes.

[V8Ian]

I was thinking mainly of passenger transport. A large proportion of our fuel is used in passenger journeys in cars that really would be better in trains, trams or buses rather than cars.

I agree that a lot of freight transport is not suited to rail, but it is difficult to see why bulk freight should not be - but spending money on rail does not win votes.

How well would that work for you, me and many others, John?

Where I live is like many others, bereft of public transport. Should I take the train to the City, for my bi-anual pilgrimage, I am forced to abandon my car at a railway carpark, a Mecca for thieves.

[scarry]

What amazes me is the huge line of cars,all idling with the AC on,outside schools at pick up time.
Some of them are parked like this for well over 45 minutes.

How times have changed,we couldn't wait to get out of school and onto our Dragstars
And get home sometime before dark,or we got a clip around the ear.

[Tins]

How well would that work for you, me and many others, John?

Same problem really. Trains don't go where I want, at a time I don't want to go.

[Tombie]

If I want to go anywhere, it’s an LV or LT or I’m not getting very far.

Decades ago we had a train station and passenger rail ran to Port Augusta and return.
From Pt Augusta there was a rail service to Adelaide.

Not any more!!!