Fuel prices Again!!!

I suspect many people would feel socially inadequate driving a 1ltr car...........unless of course EVERYONE drove 1ltr cars.

Very simplistic approach Kiteboy, obviously you are in the enviable position of not having to use too much fuel. Some of us travel to work, in my case 120km round trip every day, and yes I carpool to reduce costs, and I wouldn't do it in a 1 litre buzzbox with 3 other blokes. Above the simplistic debate you put forth, have you considered that every cent increase in fuel affects you in other, unseen ways. As well as the taxes, Australia is a big country that needs a lot of transport to get goods and services to where they are needed. Every fuel price increase pushes up the price of goods and services, which we all have to use.

I find this simplistic:

>No what people complain about is
>arbitrary price rises on Thursday (Govt payday = lots more people filling up)
>Price rises just before long weekend
>Aussie dollar weak so petrol went up - but when Aussie dollar was the strongest >on record against the USD, did fuel go down? Nup.
>Or paying more for it than other countries who import all theirs but we can be self >sufficient

The answer to all of these is FREE GLOBAL MARKET. Local Price cycle will rise when people will pay (days of more demand) Fill up on another day, solved. Base price of cycle (ignoring fluctuations) will vary on price of oil & price of crude, diesel & petrol on all foreign markets, mostly Singapore. Also dollar. Also supply / demand. Also 10 other factors you don't know.

Currently Aus is down to 6 refineries and Caltex is considering closing 2 of those mostly thanks to high dollar as well as jamnagar refinery in India in particular. If they do the others would likely follow and we would be fully importing. Nice for the environment (Refineries are major polluters and water users) but vulnerable position, particularly if dollar dives or our sea routes get threatened.

Australia is currently the richest country in the world. According to OECD data the poor in australia have been steadily getting richer.

Gunna if you were in much of the world (ignore 2 small but overrepresented areas, western europe or northern usa) you would be carpooling with at least 5 big blokes in a very small car like this. (India's most popular car)


You would feel lucky as you'd moved up from the 3 wheeler and you each had a (relatively) comfy seat.


1 in every 6 people in the world lives just in that country, that's why it's an example.

Oh and I fill a 3.5l paj, $110 on a bad day. Sure it hurts. My main car is a 2l though, it's big and fast enough.

My 2003 3 litre Toyota Avalon gets 550 kms for full tank.

A little bit of luxury like the comfy seats,plush interior,freezing air-cond and the super smooth ride help to balance the stress of life.

But it doesn't! (I'm not talking weekly cycle here, rather the base price over time) As the price of crude went up, so did fuel at the pump, and the oil co.'s said it was due to rises in crude. Fair 'nuff.
But when crude dropped 20% the petrol price for us stayed the same. (No change in the dollar or demand at that time)
They are very quick to raise it but never ever drop it. If your theory was true we'd have a couple of months with a 20c or 30c drop but the base price has only ever steadily risen for years.

Based on the aussie dollar alone, we should have had a drop for a few months in the last year.

Even worse they are like Woolies and Coles - big business forcing out the mum n dad operators.

After filling up the other day, expensively, I might add, I thought how great it would be to have a site showing local filling station prices. Searching the Net showed nothing that did that. I'm a programmer, so...

The site is up and works really well. I can get enthusiastic about the database behind it and the Ajax calls to it, but I'll spare you that. I'm a programmer, not a graphic designer, so function is my main thing.

I knew it would be hard to get filling stations to sign up, even though that is totally free and they can show their promotions as well as their prices. I emailed the fuel companies and handed out some business cards - not a response.

Have a look: http://www.petrolpricesite.com.au. It may help motorists, if I can only get filling stations to sign up.

So save money by buying petrol just after the long weekend. Same way you can save money on chocolate eggs by buying them after easter. And surfboards, by buying them after summer. And snowboards, after winter.

Good points i know that many
/most of us rely on cars and cheap fuel and not everyone can benefit like I do from an electric bike ,many years ago I decided to get an electric bike .I use it for most of my personal travel and use it to do the shopping for my shop.It suits me and my lifestyle and is a great addition to my car .I find that where I live and use it I can get around quicker and more conveniently than my car .most of my trips are less than 10 kms .(It is interesting to know that 50% of trips in cars are less than 5km with one person in the car). When it comes up in conversation most people make smart remarks about my "lazy bike" and rarely think of how they too could benefit by doing the same thing and thinking of it as an alternate and efficient form of motorised transport (some people would drive a motorised car to the dunny if they could) .My electricity bill is rediculously low too and it costs me 20 cents to rechage and get 20 km of travel .there is no rego and very little maintenance costs .i fill up my car once per month at most .I have one of the few 4wd cars in Australia that has cobwebs over the petrol cap.The price of petrol is a non issue for me,I don't notice petrol prices on servos and don't look, and don't know how much petrol is .(the car is great for longer trips and carting kids and bulky stuff around)