Diesel fuel and home heating oil are darn close to the same thing. They come from the same fraction of a barrel of crude, so it's no surprise that the price of home heating oil is up there with diesel.
What's interesting is the very high price spread between "distillate fuels" (diesel & heating oil) and gasoline. I can't recall another time when distillate fuels were ~50% more expensive than gasoline, do you?
Not off the top of my head. Certainly we've not seen that much divergence from 2017 onward (I haven't looked closely at the historical pricing data past that point and I can't recall a time when there was a shortage of diesel but not gasoline).
What is surprising about the rise in the price of home heating oil is the timing. As I understand the seasonal fluctuations in fuel production, diesel and heating oil are emphasized at different times of the year. That should have spread their respective surges in price by more than appears to have happened. (Although it has been quite some time since I looked closely at distillate fuel output in this country so I might be off in my thinking on that).
What was also interesting was the depiction of China as a factor in the global shortage of diesel, presumably because of their Zero COVID policies inhibiting petroleum refining and export of the refined products.
With China's economy contracting and even collapsing, if China is not able to sustain exports of even refined petroleum products, the world's supply chains are nowhere near done with rupture and dislocation.
Diesel fuel and home heating oil are darn close to the same thing. They come from the same fraction of a barrel of crude, so it's no surprise that the price of home heating oil is up there with diesel.
What's interesting is the very high price spread between "distillate fuels" (diesel & heating oil) and gasoline. I can't recall another time when distillate fuels were ~50% more expensive than gasoline, do you?
Not off the top of my head. Certainly we've not seen that much divergence from 2017 onward (I haven't looked closely at the historical pricing data past that point and I can't recall a time when there was a shortage of diesel but not gasoline).
What is surprising about the rise in the price of home heating oil is the timing. As I understand the seasonal fluctuations in fuel production, diesel and heating oil are emphasized at different times of the year. That should have spread their respective surges in price by more than appears to have happened. (Although it has been quite some time since I looked closely at distillate fuel output in this country so I might be off in my thinking on that).
What was also interesting was the depiction of China as a factor in the global shortage of diesel, presumably because of their Zero COVID policies inhibiting petroleum refining and export of the refined products.
With China's economy contracting and even collapsing, if China is not able to sustain exports of even refined petroleum products, the world's supply chains are nowhere near done with rupture and dislocation.