BIKE: How oil affects gasoline prices; CATCO "public" input and th e CATCO lobby

[alan_drake]

Crude oil is distilled into a variety of fractions (and then "cracked" to upgrade the fraction of gasoline to about 50%).  

Of the 42 gallons, the volume slightly expands with refining.  Still, asphalt, #6 & #5 heavy bunker oil are far less valuable than gasoline & #2 diesel.  So you should allocate a higher % of the value of "benchmark" oil to gasoline than you do.

Every year, there is a summer/winter flip in prices between gasoline & diesel/#2 heating oil.  Gasoline is higher in the summer (overly so this year due to a refining shortage) and #2 is higher in the winter.

Diesel is now slightly more expensive than gasoline and has absorbed most of the recent price increase.  But wait till summer !

I have benchmarked:

http://www.wtrg.com/daily/oilandgasspot.html#Natural

Still, your point is well taken, that much of the pump price of gasoline is relatively fixed and not tied to the price of crude oil.

Alan