Jet Fuel Is Now So Cheap It’s Being Blended for Use by Ships | Hacker News Reader

Jet Fuel Is Now So Cheap It’s Being Blended for Use by Ships

bloomberg.com

83 pointsbarney5458 comments

If I'm reading the chart right, jet fuel prices are currently negative? Is this because they keep making it and have nowhere to store it?

Also,

> very low-sulfur fuel oil for the maritime industry

I thought the maritime industry didn't care one bit about the environment and would use nasty fuel once in international waters?

I thought the maritime industry didn't care one bit about the environment and would use nasty fuel once in international waters?

They don't, but if the low-sulfur fuel is cheaper, I'm sure they would use it --- that is, unless it starts causing engine problems; ULSD has lower lubricity than regular diesel:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ultra-low-sulfur_diesel#Lubric...

When I certified the first bargeload of ULSD, overnight my lab went from doing LSD to Ultra-LSD.

> I thought the maritime industry didn't care one bit about the environment and would use nasty fuel once in international waters?

As of 2020 the sulphur limit has been lowered from the previous 3.5% to 0.5% (which is still a lot higher than modern road diesel). Alternatively, ships can use scrubbers to remove sulphur oxides from the exhaust gas.

http://www.imo.org/en/mediacentre/hottopics/pages/sulphur-20...

Price is relative to shipping fuel, not absolute values. So it's not negative!

Oh, I see. Was very curious how it could be negative for months at a time…

Amusing given the artificially high airplane prices right now. For example, if you need to make an emergency trip from SFO to Melbourne, that will run you about $10,000 right now.

Normally that flight would be about $4,000 for a next day ticket.

Flights to OZ are so expensive because the government is limiting how many passengers can arrive per day.

The government is very serious about discouraging international travel (and returning) if you’re poor.

https://www.executivetraveller.com/news/australia-to-limit-i...

https://www.pm.gov.au/media/national-cabinet-7aug2020

Would make more sense to just have an arrival tax, but why do that when you can gift the airlines their own oligopoly instead.

No, it wouldn't. The government has placed a (mostly) hard limit of 3000 people per week entering per day. An arrival tax might raise revenue but it doesn't guaranteed the policy goal - 3000 people a week.

Now, why the Federal Government isn't using its powers to set up quarantine centres on Christmas Island and other appropriate locations is a better question to be asking. They were pretty happy to do it at the beginning of the pandemic when they were quarantining people coming from China.

I honestly don't understand the OZ approach as of today.

We have immediate family there (sister in law) and are unable to visit. Heck we even would go to quarantine for 14 days in order to see them afterwards for a couple of weeks and/or some longer travels.

The current situation where ~25'000 Australians are still unable to get back home makes no sense to me. Even leaving Australia for personal travel is not really possible at this time due to the restrictions in place.

They've determined that the risk of quarantine scales with the quantity of people going through it.

Given the entirety of the current outbreak has been traced back to quarantine failures, this is somewhat understandable.

Im in Sydney. During the peak in Q1-Q2 ~60% of infections were travelers arriving from overseas. We're currently at 3-10 infections per day, with about 50-75% of those continuing to be overseas travelers.

As you noted both quarantine and testing is imperfect. I have no desire to open the doors and have a repeat of Iceland or Victoria writ large. Yes, I'm disappointed at not seeing overseas friends and family for (at least) the next year or two. But that seems like a relatively small price to pay for the relative quiet, healthy, functioning society here.

As long as my family are able to stay healthy sure.

Possibly having wait until critical illness or death before I am able to visit and help with an exemption on compassionate grounds does not reflect a healthy and functioning society in my opinion. It might be quiet though.

Im over here looking at states where I have family and your same dilemma. I suspect it's relative in these times, but Im thankful I ended up on this side of the pond.

Yes, this is the libertarian viewpoint.

In the rest of the world, we think that in a healthy society, we as individuals sometimes have to sacrifice for the greater good of everyone. In the United States, self-sacrifice is only good if you die killing others in the "service" of your country.

The rest of us see ideas like quarantine not as the sign of a unhealthy and dysfunctional society but proof that we can work together to beat even a fearsome, non-human enemy like a pandemic.

And now these two contrasting ideas are being tested by COVID-19. We'll see in the end whose idea works better - your individualistic views, or our cooperative ones.

What current outbreak are you referring to? E.g. there is no outbreak in that sense e.g. in Western Australia (Perth).

> We have immediate family there (sister in law) and are unable to visit.

Visiting people shouldn't be anyone's priority, right now! Of course they're denying such an optional activity.

What a dystopia. And you seem to actively want it. Disturbing.

"You want to take basic medical precautions against a pandemic! That disturbs me."

Why?! Why does that disturb you? What disturbs the rest of us is watching America refusing to believe in basic medical facts!@

I didn’t say I wanted it. I didn’t express any opinion. I said it was obvious why they’re doing it.

Why should visiting after 14days of quarantine be an issue?

Is the quarantine when you get there? Doesn’t that put at risk:

- everyone working at the airport and on the flight

- everyone else on the flight over

- people in the hospital if you get sick while quarantining

And that’s even if people are obeying the quarantine. Which they often don’t.

All that for a social visit? Why?

You're right about your points. Yes, there is current quarantine for arrivals in Australia when you get there. Masking removes some of that risk.

This could be solveable with a negative test and few days of quarantine pre-travel. Some countries are indeed looking at that.

> All that for a social visit? Why?

How long would you want to _not_ visit your immediate family members? What's your personal threshold?

> How long would you want to _not_ visit your immediate family members? What's your personal threshold?

People sometimes manage not seeing their actual immediate families like children and spouses for a year (for example military). It’s only been six months so far. Can people genuinely not go without seeing their siblings in-law for everyone’s sake?

I was curious to learn another data point here, I asked you directly about your personal threshold - the reference to military is valid for nations with active long term deployments (not valid for my own comparison).

My favorite budget airline is doing $11 flights. I flew Denver -> SF this weekend for $33.

Europe as well had bargain basement prices over the summer.

Australia, on the other hand, is still in Covid elimination mode. I know that Perth right now is only letting in 75 people a day, and I can imagine you're paying for a lot of empty seats on a long range liner.

I'm the case of Perth, it seems the one flight in per day is coming from Singapore. Therefore in my case it would be a matter of getting there first, which is a bit cheaper. Still, factor in the cost of quarantine and you're back to 10 grand. Unfortunately won't be making it back for Christmas this year :(

Perth might let in 75 people in a day, but regular travel for tourists is still not possible, at all. Even if they would go to for quarantine.

https://covid19.homeaffairs.gov.au/travel-restrictions

It's crazy isn't it!

We had a trip back to Perth penciled in for September this year but as you can imagine thats been put on a somewhat indefinite hold...

The countries 3,000 total last I checked. Also you must be an AU citizen or PR to enter & must have health ministry approval. Similarly to leave citizens require ministry approval (which IIRC has been granted about 2,500 times so far).

Which one? Is it Spirit? Those guys are a nightmare.

Frontier. Agreed, spirit isn’t even worth flying.

Berlin -> Dublin 20 euro here.

Yes, in some places they've switched to the model where the focus is on the people who really need to fly.

Turn it into cheese!

That's worrying. Jet fuel is hellaciously toxic and I wonder how prepared shipboard operators are to handle the proper safety precautions.

Bunker fuel is usually awful too, and this stuff has less sulfur at least.

For anyone unaware, bunker fuel is an absolutely nasty mixture. Ships are able to do anything they want once in international waters, which means it just gets dumped on the regular only to then follow environmental rules when at a destination.

i thought new restrictions on sulfur largely reduced emissions in shipping.

https://e360.yale.edu/features/at-last-the-shipping-industry...

I hadn't realize the new restrictions were that low.

Jet fuel is just kerosene. Why do you say it's hellaciously toxic? It's pretty similar to other fuels like gasoline.

In rural areas you can buy kerosene at gas stations, there are no special precautions above and beyond the same ones used for gasoline for cars.

Perhaps you're thinking of fuel for fighter jets? Because some of those can be incredibly toxic.

> Jet fuel is just kerosene. Why do you say it's hellaciously toxic? It's pretty similar to other fuels like gasoline.

Indeed. Jet fuel is quite similar to diesel oil, except it's slightly more volatile (on average slightly shorter hydrocarbon chains). To the point it's possible to run (some, not all) diesel engines on jet fuel.

> In rural areas you can buy kerosene at gas stations, there are no special precautions above and beyond the same ones used for gasoline for cars.

There's also kerosene as in lamp oil, or used as cooking fuel e.g. in camping equipment. That is a specially refined very pure form of kerosine. You shouldn't use jet fuel in your camping stove.

> Perhaps you're thinking of fuel for fighter jets? Because some of those can be incredibly toxic.

Some fighter jets (F-16 at least) used hydrazine (which is incredibly toxic) for some emergency power generation turbine. But the main fuel is still normal jet fuel. Though the military version of jet fuel (JP-8) contains some additives, but the effect of those is quite minor.

Once jet fuel has been onboard an aircraft, it can't be sold to any other airline / operators due to possible contamination.

So if a pilot needs an aircraft defuelled for whatever reason (maintenance, etc), some airports will simply use that fuel as diesel for their own airside vehicles.

There's also Avgas. That's still leaded.

Still dyed green when leaded, blue when unleaded became available in recent decades.

Here's the Safety Data Sheet for JET A-1[0]:

>H226 Flammable liquid and vapour

>H315 Causes skin irritation

>H336 May cause drowsiness or dizziness

>H304 May be fatal if swallowed and enters airways

>H411 Toxic to aquatic life with long lasting effect

[0] https://www.neste.fi/static/ktt/10505_eng.pdf

That's basically true of any fuel on the petroleum spectrum.

Here's an MSDS for what you pump into your car as fuel: https://www.vercounty.org/MSDS/EMA/9950allgradesgasoline.pdf. Note how it's basically saying the same thing?

So you shouldn't drink it, breathe it, or swim in it? I don't know if I'd call that "hellacious" in the "things I won't work with" sense.

For "things I won't work with" it needs atleast "flammable upon contact with skin/oxygen" or "friction explosive, no lower bound" or even "highly toxic and highly carcinogenic".

"so rapidly hypergolic that no ignition delay has ever been measured"

Sounds like kerosene.

It isn't "just kerosene".

It it MOSTLY kerosene, but as usual it's the last 1% that kills you - various additives to prevent things like icing and corrosion, and benzene and various napthas.

Kerosine came first as a high-flash-point (for safety reasons) lamp fuel somewhat comparable to whale oil.

Gasoline is very volatile intentionally, but kerosine is supposed to be not-so-easy to ignite.

If you ever had to light a kerosine furnace on a cold winter day, you can drop a number of lit matches right into an ounce of it and a few will simply be extinguished before one finally catches fire.

Later, Diesel type engines could then then run on it, generally better than they could on the animal and vegetable oils which are similar enough.

Then came jet engines and industrial turbines.

Benzene and light naphthas are low-flash-point gasoline-range hydrocarbon components not found in measurable amounts in jet fuel.

However, other hydrocarbons found in jet fuel could one day be determined to be just as much of a political pollutant as Benzene.

It's possible for the same diesel-range tank to pass all modern specifications for kerosine, diesel, and jet, though rarely done.

Kerosine still has a lamp burning test, diesel has cetane requirement, turbo has various stability and trace metal specs, not shared with the other usages.

No. 1 Diesel is lighter and allows for better acceleration (but use gasoline when you really need to accelerate uphill) so it's great for Mercedes or big pickup owners, No. 2 diesel is the heavier stuff for long haul trucking MPG.

YMMV

https://www.bizjournals.com/sanantonio/news/2019/06/10/air-f...

https://casetext.com/case/lambert-v-bp-products-north-americ...

https://oem.bmj.com/content/60/12/969

Benzene, in particular, has an accepted safe exposure level of zero.

Mayn't your thinking about hydeazine?

It is used in sons jets, eg the F16 emergency power unit is fired by hydra one, but it's not usually called 'jet fuel', more like rocket fuel.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrazine

It's certainly polluting, but it's no 80s Formula 1 fuel:

"It should be mentioned that the final versions of these synthetic fuels had been very expensive, up to $ 300 per litre, and also in some cases very poisonous."

https://forums.autosport.com/topic/34397-bmws-exotic-fuel-in...

Uh what? Jet fuel is basically the same as kerosene. It's no more toxic than gasoline or any other hydrocarbon.

jet fuel is routinely dumped if needed:

https://www.popsci.com/story/technology/airplane-fuel-dumpin...

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