[Revi]

Great article about our present predicament!

Consciousness of Sheep really nailed it with this one. I just noticed that the price of diesel has gone up another 10 cents in the past week or two. We are really going to be in trouble soon! And when shipping goes to low sulphur we'll compound our troubles!

https://consciousnessofsheep.co.uk/2018 ... thing-pin/

[Revi]

Basically what he says is that rising diesel prices are the pin that will pop the everything bubble. It's a very plausible scenario. Basically what they are saying is that all oil isn't the same. You can't make diesel out of a mixture of Syncrude and light fracked oil. There is a resource that the world runs on and it's getting tight. Distillates make all sorts of things also, like kerosene and jet fuel. It's causing trouble in Europe right now!

[Newfie]

It would make my life more difficult for sure. But it may be exactly what we need.

[Tanada]

IMO all this yammering about Diesel fuel shortages is pure hype aimed at getting something. For one thing the EU is about to start enforcing the switch from high sulfur heavy oil diesel for merchant ship fuel to low sulfur fuel, the easiest of which to get is the ultra low sulfur road diesel already in mass use. For another thing it is December, when demand for Fuel oil #2 aka Diesel fuel #2 is at high seasonal demand for heating. For a third China has added another 20,000,000+ road vehicles in 2018 a number of which use Diesel fuel.

Put it all together and what do you get? Speculators see an opportunity to talk up diesel prices and make a tidy sum of profit.

The truth is the same process that converts high sulfur old fashion Diesel #2 road fuel into ultra low sulfur fuel works the same way for residual Diesel #4 oil that is used to fuel marine diesel engines. Pretending the shipping industry can't possibly acquire fuel that meets the new EU fuel requirement is pure sophistry at its most egregious. Ultra low sulfur road fuel was made standard well over a decade ago now in most places so refiners have all the equipment and experience to use the same process for the marine fuel. But the MSM is replete with articles about how merchant shippers are being 'forced to switch to LNG' and similar nonsense.

Any merchant switching to LNG fuel is doing so because they see and advantage in making the switch, not because ultra low sulfur heavy fuel oil is impossible to get or manufacture. I suspect in some places they might actually save money making the switch if the LNG is cheap enough.

Baring all that if a real shortage were to develop, at least for North America where natural gas is both abundant and cheap, running methane through a modified FT process gets you abundant cheap sulfur free diesel fuel. It only takes a few months to build the facilities to do so as the technology is almost a century old, well understood, and economically viable if Diesel fuel is expensive. In a true emergency TPTB would clear all the obstacles as Diesel is very important to the proper function of modern civilization.

But its not so hard to get that more than a few months disruption is the worst case scenario.

[Tanada]

Onlooker, I dug up the Diesel Shortage thread and pinned it for your reading pleasure. Notice people have been making this same basic prediction for 13 years and counting!

Diesel Shortage

[marmico]

Champ d'lysee , 1968.

[Pops]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Revi', 'Y')ou can't make diesel out of a mixture of Syncrude and light fracked oil.

[jawagord]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Revi', 'B')asically what he says is that rising diesel prices are the pin that will pop the everything bubble. It's a very plausible scenario. Basically what they are saying is that all oil isn't the same. You can't make diesel out of a mixture of Syncrude and light fracked oil. There is a resource that the world runs on and it's getting tight. Distillates make all sorts of things also, like kerosene and jet fuel. It's causing trouble in Europe right now!
]

[GHung]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('jawagord', ' ')........

NWR’s solution is to convert the[b] raw bitumen directly into the low carbon, ultra low sulphur diesel and diluents that are in critically short supply and high demand in Canada.[/b]This maximizes the value for all Albertans by generating higher margins on raw materials, while making environmentally responsible products that the market needs, and at competitive prices. NWR is focused on producing a range of cleaner, high value products needed to meet Alberta’s increasing demand and North America’s new low carbon standards.

[asg70]

We shouldn't be using diesel anyway. Remember diselgate? Diesel is inherently dirty (maybe even WVO).

[Arthur75]

Mail exchange between Gail Tverberg and Antonio Turiel about peak diesel or not :
https://cassandralegacy.blogspot.com/20 ... ebate.html

[marmico]

There appears to be an error with Turiel's data. I compute 2017 [2015] average (not 12 month trailing average) gasoil/diesel production from the JODI data set as 26.275 [26.308] Mb/d. Just rounding errors.

[Revi]

What does this mean Marmico?

[Revi]

Big debate over it on Cassandra's Legacy. Clash of the titans! Turiel vs. Tverberg.

I don't know if it's happening or not, but I noticed that the price of kerosene went up by a dime last week. It seems like we are getting to some kind of a peak. Other things are going down.

[rockdoc123]

I think there is a danger of looking at individual product demands peaking (whether it is temporary or more long-lasting) versus oil (where it all comes from) peaking. Refineries can be refitted, consumption patterns change regarding fuel type but regardless overall demand for oil (measured through consumption) continues to increase. It might change from one end product to another but the important issue is not peak one product vs the other product but rather peak oil. I guess what I'm saying is that demand might have peaked for diesel but apparently it hasn't for other petroleum products given overall demand keeps increasing. It's important to look at the trees but also important to look at the trees in the context of the forest.

[Pops]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Revi', 'O')ther things are going down.

[vtsnowedin]

I see that diesel and distillate stocks declined 4.2 million barrels last week. With air and truck traffic high from a booming holiday season and winter heating oil demand a bit higher then average this is understandable. Such fluctuations are why the industry keeps the stocks in storage that it does.
With demand that strong I don't see the decline in oil prices lasting very long unless depression in other countries develops very quickly.