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The U.S. Diesel Shortage Is Worsening
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- pcurve 4y agoCost of diesel in the US is hilariously out of control. It’s far cheaper to drive gasoline
- Ancapistani 4y agoTell me about it. My spouse's vehicle was down for the past two months, and they've been driving an F350 Super Duty. It was >$175 to fill up.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- bamboozled 4y agoI’ll get hammered for this, but why do people own cars like that, why on earth would people need a F350 super duty ? What practical purpose would it serve ? The climate is breaking down and people are cruising around in trucks like that? I don’t know…
- fragmede 4y agoAcual farm usage. off-road moving of landscaping materials and tools. pulling horse or sheep or pig trailers. or boats. there are actual legitimate reasons to own such a beast but of course not everyone that owns it uses it for that purpose so accusations that the user "doesn't really need one" are rife. but that's capitalism for ya.
- reustle 4y agoI grew up in a pretty rural part of the US and while those use cases were absolutely common for a decent percentage of large truck owners, they only used them for those purposes about 5-10% of the time. The more reasonable folks had a small simple car for their daily driver, and weren't worried about using their big truck as a status symbol.
- gruez 4y ago>they only used them for those purposes about 5-10% of the time. "5-10%" works out to once every 1-2 weeks. That seems like a pretty good reason to have such a truck, considering that if you actually needed it it would be a huge hassle to rent one. I haven't done the math on this, but I imagine that if you used it even once every 3-4 weeks you'd come out ahead on time/money.
- dsfyu404ed 4y agoHow much ass does the second row of your average sedan see? I'd be surprised if it's even 5-10% of trips. Never-mind that if they were using the vehicle (sedan, pickup or otherwise) right up to the limit of it's capacity the majority of the time many here would be hand wringing about how they really should be using something with more spare capacity. This is fundamentally a societal expectations problem. People expect you to have more vehicle than you need. If you are maxing out what you have regularly you are "doing it wrong".
- deltarholamda 4y ago>they only used them for those purposes about 5-10% While true, when you need them, there is no substitute. So the answer is to have two vehicles, which may not be economically viable. Also, everybody has really strong opinions on the legitimacy of owning a truck until they need help moving.
- acdha 4y agoThere's a certain logic for that but buying a luxury truck means you're paying a LOT more — like enough to buy one or even two additional new cars for every trip you don't need a truck for — and you're paying for a bunch of expensive stuff which is less durable for the times when you do need to use it as a work truck. If I'm moving, I can rent a truck from Home Depot which has a considerably larger bed for well under one percent of the extra cost of buying a super-sized truck. If I move less frequently than every day for a year, I'm still ahead by tens of thousands of dollars even before you consider how much extra I'd be paying to burn more fuel, which costs more per gallon, for every trip where I'm not doing something which needs that much towing capacity. You can pay a moving company to move your stuff multiple times a year, save tens of thousands of dollars, and not even have to pack your stuff.
- dsfyu404ed 4y ago>why do people own cars like that, why on earth would people need a F350 super duty ? What practical purpose would it serve ? Same practical purpose as all the 4Runners that HNers with 2-kid households own, fulfilling societal expectations for amount of excess vehicle that is required at that point on the socio-economic ladder.
- rootusrootus 4y agoHumans sure are judgemental creatures. Especially from the safety of their keyboard, where they are not subject to anyone else checking them for hypocrisy. Perhaps we could be a little more realistic and assume that the majority of people just buy what they need.
- rootusrootus 4y ago> I’ll get hammered for this, but why do people own cars like that, why on earth would people need a F350 super duty ? What practical purpose would it serve ? The only reason you'd get hammered for that question is the implicit assumption that nobody who owns an HD truck needs it. You might see me drive to the store once in a while in my F250. So you'd probably wonder why I needed such a massive gas guzzling grocery getter? Well, because that day my wife took the Bolt and I had no other option. People fall for this fallacy all the time, assuming that if you see someone underutilizing their truck, they must always be underutilizing it. But I only drive mine a thousand miles a year, and except for rare occasions only when a travel tailer is attached behind it. The rest of the time we drive my wife's Bolt, and I'll wager that my average fuel consumption is lower than most people who only have an economy car.
- iancmceachern 4y agoMe too! I love seeing a fellow RVer here on HN, pretty small overlap between the two I expect. In also live in SF.
- chrisseaton 4y ago> I had no other option Buy a smaller car? Walk?
- ls15 4y agoBoth of these don't tow the trailer.
- Fatnino 4y agoTrucks do have a use sometimes, and some people keep a truck on standby while using a more efficient car most of the time. With that set up a situation can arise where the one efficient car is in use while the other driver needs to be somewhere. It is completely irrational to expect them to maintain a 3rd vehicle for this rare case.
- Ancapistani 4y ago> Buy a smaller car? So your solution to the incremental pollution caused by driving “too much vehicle”… is to mine, refine, and manufacture a second vehicle?
- animitronix 4y agoI remember the same question being asked about Escalades 20 years ago. Nothing changes.
- poopnugget 4y ago
- Ancapistani 4y agoIt’s a farm truck, mostly. A truck of that size is absolutely necessary when you’re hauling a flatbed trailer full of hay or livestock. Because we’re able to afford multiple vehicles, it spends most of its life sitting in my parents’ driveway. They drive it once a month or so to avoid the issues that come with a vehicle not being used at all, but otherwise it makes little sense to drive it when both I and my parents have more efficient vehicle for day-to-day stuff. Honestly, I understand what you’re getting at, but it’s a matter of perspective. Both I and my dad keep a current Class A CDL so we can drive that truck with a loaded trailer. When we need it, the alternative is hiring a semi - and it’s significantly both less expensive and less polluting per mile than a semi tractor.
- Gigachad 4y agoThese kinds of vehicles should be treated like tractors. Very limited road access. You shouldn’t be able to drive to Walmart in one.
- garciasn 4y agoIf someone wants to spend the money to buy one and pay the $200 to fill it up, so be it. If they think it’s somehow less money to buy a $80K truck than to rent a truck once a year, cool. But to say it should somehow not be allowed on the road is absurd.
- Gigachad 4y agoHow exactly should they be paying for the increased risk to peoples safety and the extra air pollution they create. Should we be calculating the number of years they took off people lives due to the particulate pollution? If they have an accident and kill someone, should that be punished more harshly than regular since they chose to pick a more dangerous form of transport?
- gort19 4y ago> If they have an accident and kill someone, should that be punished more harshly than regular since they chose to pick a more dangerous form of transport? By this logic, every vehicle would have a different punishment associated with it.
- iancmceachern 4y agoIt's no different than a Range Rover, a Bentley, a Ferrari, heck even. M3. MY f250 diesel gets better milage than my neighbors M3, and it saves the climate in many ways compared to his M3. If yoi compare an average M3 owner who Flys for work or vacation every 4 months to me, who has a Diesel f250 that is driven only to tow a travel trailer RV which we use every few months for work/pleasure travel, along with the relative carbon usage for say a hotel and all its laundry vs. staying in my RV I believe it's a wash.
- lob_it 4y agoInstead of accelerating a recession, perhaps more resources will be dedicated to biofuels to keep industry and vehicles powered for decades to come. Many industries are "beyond a crisis", which makes many of the shortfalls in supply/production/service quality, just a lingering fact that was omnipresent prepandemic and even pre-21st century.
- Analemma_ 4y agoDear god no. Ethanol subsidies in America are already a catastrophe; we need to be getting rid of them, not making the problem worse.
- lob_it 4y agohttps://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/biofuels/biodiesel-rd-other-basics.php https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/biofuels/biodiesel-rd-ot... I can agree that diversification is a good thing. I haven't looked into it, but this article states Henry Ford wanted hemp biofuels to run the model-T. The hemp rush would satisfy your high fructose corn syrup desires too. https://wayofleaf.com/hemp/hemp-biofuels https://wayofleaf.com/hemp/hemp-biofuels
- c_o_n_v_e_x 4y agoBiofuels, in their current form, have the nasty "bug" of competing with food commodities in terms of commodity usage (corn for food vs fuel) and planted farm land (grow crop X for food vs crop y for fuel).
- lob_it 4y agoWith the expected increase in temperatures and forecasts of drought/flood extremes, we should expect agriculture to adapt to 21st century modeling. The climate and terrain are different everywhere, so these changes may be regional efforts instead of global. Its not the same old song and dance, whatever it is.
- c_o_n_v_e_x 4y ago
- cinntaile 4y agoI wonder how this will impact the average car size? I would expect to see fewer big pickup trucks being used by people that don't need them in the near future?
- dsfyu404ed 4y agoVehicles are bought and sold on longer time horizons than the shortage, diesel pickups were always somewhat of a rounding error and they kinda fell out of fashion hard about 5yr ago when emissions components got bad/numerous enough that the TCO didn't pencil out vs gas trucks. The OEMs saw this (the emissions driven increased TCO of diesel, not the shortage) coming ~10yr ago rolled out a new generation of gas engines for pickups, vas and MDTs which hit market in the last couple years so if anything this will drive a faster transition back to gasoline engines in those applications.
- willio58 4y agoElectric trucks will surely fill that gap
- amanaplanacanal 4y agoGiven how polluting diesel is, this could be a good thing long term. So much of our commercial transportation is dependent on it though, so this is a major pain point short term.
- LinuxBender 4y agoAmazon ships all their goods on trains and big rigs both of which use diesel. Will the cost of items on Amazon go up? Or maybe just availability goes down once the edge distribution centers are depleted?
- bamboozled 4y agoHave you seen the price of regular fuel? It’s not much better.
- SigmundA 4y agoDiesel is more efficient than gas as far as MPG, so CO2 is actually less per mile, NOx and particulates should be equivalent on a modern diesel with DPF and DEF SCR.
- zug_zug 4y agoDoesn't pass the smell test - I can smell diesel exhaust from at least 100 feet away (maybe 10x as pungent as non-diesel), has to be something I'm smelling
- idiotsecant 4y agoIf i let an egg rot in your yard you'll smell it too, doesn't mean it has a meaningful contribution to nox, particulate, or carbon emissions. Things can be smelly without being bad emissions-wise.
- SigmundA 4y agoIs it a modern diesel with DPF and SCR? The smell from the exhaust of my 2021 6.7 liter cummins diesel motorhome is actually almost undetectable to me while my 2016 V10 gas motorhome had a very noticeable smell. Perhaps the diesel is not ULSD https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-low-sulfur_diesel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-low-sulfur_diesel
- bamboozled 4y agoNothing makes sense anymore, I read that Exxon mobile made record profits this year. How? We’ve messed ourselves up so hard relying on oil companies the way we do, how’s it’s the peasants that are paying for endless price gouging.
- finiteseries 4y agoBy maxing out supply amid unending demand, they have a terrific product/market fit. https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/pet_pnp_unc_dcu_nus_m.htm https://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/pet_pnp_unc_dcu_nus_m.htm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supply_and_demand https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supply_and_demand Here’s a map of the places that create diesel from crude oil. Note the north & south east where these shortages are occurring, and limited to. https://atlas.eia.gov/datasets/6547eda91ef84cc386e23397cf834524_0/explore?location=36.677242%2C-86.070248%2C3.63 https://atlas.eia.gov/datasets/6547eda91ef84cc386e23397cf834... It has been 45 years since a >200,000 barrel per day refinery was built in the US. 1998-2015 saw 0 upgrades to existing capacity or new builds. Since 2015, a handful of <50,000 barrel per day refineries have been built, but every single one is in Texas.
- iwillbenice 4y ago
- water8 4y ago
- esarbe 4y agoGood. Hopefully that will create some incentives to switch to electrical systems and invest in renewables.