Suit Challenges Warm Gasoline

NYTimes ^ | December 15, 2006 | NYTimes

[Coffee_drinker]

there might (might) be some shrinkage...

I was in the Pool!!! I was in the Pool!!!

[Minutemen]

That would be dependent upon ambient temperature, type of tank and how deep the tank is buried and what temperature the gasoline in the tanker truck was when unloaded.

[Calvin Locke]

...since the TAXES are by volume too.

A caller to Limbaugh in the past year was gas station owner in NJ, iirc. He said the state taxes him on what was said to
be delivered by the tanker, not was he ends up really selling.

That is, he still pays taxes on the "shrinkage" in the ground.

[gcruse]

" I sure hope these people in Ca. are not like my x, and they believe all the gas is stored inside the pump"

No kidding. My x and I had been married about ten years when she saw me finish shooting a roll of film and open the camera back to take out the film. She looked in the back of the empty camera and asked me where the pictures were.

Here's the kicker. I had been working in the photo industry for fifteen years at the time.

[Minutemen]

You are kidding, right?

[gcruse]

I'm completely serious.

[Elsiejay]

A key point, overlooked by almost everyone. I doubt that the temperature of the fuel being pumped from its underground storage tank will have changed appreciably in the few minutes while the fuel tank of a truck or car is being filled.

[traditional1]

"Gasoline expands quite a bit in higher temps"

Dating myself, I used to fly on these and remember an 0700 takeoff time where the fuel tanks were filled in the early AM hours, flying out of Otis AFB, on Cape Cod. When we got on board, we looked at the wings, and fuel was POURING out of the tanks due to expansion in the sunshine as they had filled them fully in the cool morning hours, and it was expanding....

Ground crews came and siphoned off fuel to remove excess and make expansion space available.

Yes, fuel (including gasoline) really can expand quite a bit!

[3niner]

It also contracts when the temperature is below 60, and the temperature that matters is the temperature underground, not at the surface.

[SierraWasp]

I love it! That's just priceless!! I always try to buy my gasoline in the chilly morning hours!!! (grin) So sue me!!! Phhhhhhhhhhhht!!!

[353FMG]

No, the same principle does not apply; milk and beer are sold in closed containers independent of temperature correction.

If you want to play this game with milk for instance you would start by measuring the temperature and fat content at the moment the milk comes out of the teet (which is at cow's body temperature). Further processing of the milk will change its temperature (density) and fat content (density).

The lawyers play these games because they heard about "60 degree barrels" that is used as the standard for crude sales. Crude is sold by API gravity (density) at whatever temperature and recalculated to what its condition would be at 60 degrees Fahrenheit. It is all very simple, but there is money to be made from the unwary. And where there is money, there is a lawyer.

[Arrowhead1952]

Yes, fuel (including gasoline) really can expand quite a bit!

I'll never forget trying to explain that to a chopper pilot. He had no idea that fuel (JP8) expands at higher temps. That stuff is dangerous at any temp.

[Dog Gone]

Despite living here in Texas, SW, I'm a licensed California lawyer, and I know suing you would be the lawsuit of my career. I doubt Rough and Ready, California has a courthouse, but that's dang sure where I'd like that rootin' tootin' trial to take place.

;-)

[papasmurf]

It's not asinine.

Gasoline is sold wholesale based on temperature, not volume or weight. Yet we are buying it based on volume. The volume is inflated while in the stations' holding tanks. When we deliver fuel, we have to take the temperature, and log it. It, then, gets converted to gallons based on that temp. That's how it gets billed to the stations. The higher the temp., the more volume, but less energy content...which translates into lower power and lower MPG. Just follow a trucker delivering at night, be careful :), and watch what he does, you'll see why you are getting ripped off.


:O)

P

I know this how? I'm a trucker.

[SierraWasp]

Wull dagnabbit! That there's muh pickchur!!! Yosemighty Sam!!!

Lessee... Rough and Ready, Hangtown, Cool or Correctionville... Which one will it be? Oops! Here come da judge!!!

[Dog Gone]

Rough and Ready is the only one of those I've personally visited.

Most awesome city name, EVER.

[rottndog]

Gas tanks are buried in the ground, and insulated. The amount by which the temperature of the gas in the tank varies with ambient temperatures above ground is probably very minuscule. This lawsuit is stupid.

[spunkets]

" Gasoline is sold wholesale based on temperature, not volume or weight."

No it's not. Temp is just a correction factor for volume. It's sold by volume. A tanker of 5000/gals at $2.50/gal and 10^oF difference could see a ~$120 difference. 20 gals under the same conditions would be worth $0.05. They could change the price by a penny, because their butt itches and that would be worth $0.20.

The thermal volumetric expansion coefficient for gasoline is 0.95*10^-3/^oC. That's the volume change V/V_o per degrees C(K). IOWs the change is ~0.1%/^oC. That's ~2^oF/^oC.

So, 10^oF is a change of 0.5% on the cost. If gas is $2.50, then that's $0.024/gal at 10^oF, or 0.24 cents /gal/^oF.

[spunkets]

How many of the lawyers and folks named in this suit would stoop to pick up a penny laying on the ground. Most of them wouldn't pick up a dime. The lawyers will bill $35 bucks for $15 mins simply, because a stupid question was asked.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

To continue with my heavy oil discussion: Sellers of asphalt liquid resolved this issue long ago when they began selling it by the ton. A ton of asphalt is about 235 US gallons, depending on the API gravity. They don't worry about temperature because a ton is always a ton. Ditto bunker fuels, sold in metric tons. A ton of N6 is about 270 US gallons. A ton of diesel fuel (N2 fuel oil) is 312 US gallons.