Gasoline Demand -- October 15, 2022

Gasoline demand, link here.

Some say there may have been come EIA manipulating of the graph earlier this summer, and I did not argue against that. Regardless of what may or may not have happened during the summer, I am now confident that the graph is accurate to thee extent that such data is ever accurate.

Four things:

• the price of gasoline is trending higher again, and folks know how to conserve gasoline if they need to;
• the Florida hurricane
• driving season is way over
• cars really are getting great mileage
  

EVs are not the reason. 

Before we get to the graph, did anyone notice that US refiners are now operating below 90% of their capacity?

Look at the weekly drop, astonishing, in million bpd:

• 9/23/22: 8.825
• 9/30/22: 9.465
• 10/7/22: 8.276 -- a 13% drop in gasoline demand week-over-week

Inflation, for the individual,

• the cost per gallon has increased significantly, but
• the overall amount being spent on gasoline may be decreasing?
• that's certainly true for some of us 
• I was quite surprised how little I actually paid for gasoline from DFW to Nashville driving a Enterprise rental Hyundai Kona.
  

Diesel: the real concern has moved from gasoline to diesel

• if one wants to see why diesel fuel is now the real concern, not gasoline, drive I-40 from Memphis to Nashville
• from this week's EIA weekly petroleum report
• distillate fuel inventories decreased by a whopping 4.9 million barrels last week and are about 23% below the five year average for this time of year.
• propane is in good shape:
• propane/propylene inventories increased by 1.1 million barrels from last week and are 1% above the five year average for this time of year.

The "numbers" this week were absolutely stunning.