On 2008/03/08, at 1:24 AM, Bill Hooper wrote:
On 2008 Mar 7 , at 2:07 AM, Pat Naughtin wrote:
For example, oil sold at 100 $(USD)/barrel works out to be close
to 63 cents per barrel.
Is that a misprint?
How can $100/per barrel close to 63ยข per barrel?
Bill Hooper
1810 mm tall
Fernandina Beach, Florida, USA
Dear Bill,
You are right it was a misprint. It should have read:
100 $ (USD) = 63 cents per litre
The calculation I made was 100 $ / 159 L = 0.628 93 $/L and I rounded
this to 63 cents/litre.
My revised email should read:
Dear All,
Consider this paragraph from: http://www.nebusiness.co.uk/business-
news/latest-business-news/2008/03/05/food-for-thought-as-prices-go-on-
rising-51140-20557627/
The process of metrication in the pricing structure of petrol and
diesel is a clever way of disguising what the real cost is to those
who were brought up with gallons, but nevertheless the fact remains
that there will be a huge knock-on effect across a range of commodity
pricing this spring and summer.
The sad part about fuel pricing is that it is done under the
obfuscation (deliberate confusion) of pricing by the barrel. For
example, oil sold at 100 $(USD)/barrel works out to be close to 63
cents per litre. But this information is not provided each day in the
UK, the USA, or in Australia where fuel prices today are about $1.45
(AUD) per litre (= 0.67 GBP or $1.35 USD).
Once we are all thinking and talking in litres all along the oil
processing chain we can discuss relative costs and margins. Getting
the morning fix in barrels, converting this to gallons and then (in
most nations) to litres does no-one any good.
By the way, the oil barrel never actually existed in any physical
sense. No oil has ever actually been poured into a barrel for
measuring purposes. The oil barrel is a theoretical construct based
on a notional compromise barrel of about 35 UK gallons (BP), about 42
USA gallons (Exxon), or about 159 litres (Shell). The price per
barrel you see in the morning paper is there simply there for pricing
in such a way that the public will not understand the pricing process.
Cheers and thanks for your help with this,
Pat Naughtin
PO Box 305 Belmont 3216,
Geelong, Australia
Phone: 61 3 5241 2008
Metric system consultant, writer, and speaker, Pat Naughtin, has
helped thousands of people and hundreds of companies upgrade to the
modern metric system smoothly, quickly, and so economically that they
now save thousands each year when buying, processing, or selling for
their businesses. Pat provides services and resources for many
different trades, crafts, and professions for commercial, industrial
and government metrication leaders in Asia, Europe, and in the USA.
Pat's clients include the Australian Government, Google, NASA, NIST,
and the metric associations of Canada, the UK, and the USA. See
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