Who makes what fuel???

Fuel normally comes from the closest refinery or bulk coastal plant regardless of brand.

Saves a heap in transport.

In Melbourne most fuel is taken from the Mobil Yarraville bulk depot and all brands of road tankers come and go 24 hours a day.
The depot is supplied by pipeline from the Mobil Altona refinery and by tanker from various other locations such as Singapore.

The brand means nothing, its all the same and made to Australian fuel standards.

Kroozer, You are describing the Refinery exchange scheme, which was stopped several years ago. Companies used to swap a litre of fuel in a state where they had a refinery for a litre in a state where they didn't. No money changed hands, and it did save carting the stuff back and forth. The now just buy the fuel from each other where they need it.

John, You are certainly correct. I thought that I'd expand slightly so that you can all get a clearer picture. The Australian Refineries are:

Perth- BP(running OK)
Melbourne- Shell(running OK) and Mobil (at reduced rates since Clean Fuels in 2007)
Sydney- Caltex(running OK) and Shell (not currently running- don't know when/if they will restart- some time in 2009?)
Brisbane- BP(running OK) and Caltex (who had the problem last week and are still in the process of starting up)
Adelaide- Mobil refinery shutdown several years ago.

What this means is that in the states where companies have a Refinery, they supply their own brand and the brands who don't have Refineries there. All import also, but normally into remote terminals which are close to Singapore to optimise cartage.
So, if you buy BP diesel in Perth or Brisbane, it comes from a BP Refinery.
If you buy Caltex diesel in Brisbane or Sydney, it comes from a Caltex Refinery.
If you buy diesel in Darwin, Cairns or Broome, then chances are it came from Singapore. All Perth fuel comes from the BP over there.
Specialty fuels (eg. Pulp 98) however are often made by the company who sells it and carted all around Australia to their terminals.

You should not notice much difference between fuels, but different Refineries run different crudes and have slightly different processes.

Just to dispel another common myth- diesel is not a byproduct of the production of petrol, and does not require "less processing". In fact, it is hard work and costs a lot of money to make modern ultra low sulphur diesel. I know that it is trendy to brand Australian fuel as "poor quality", but that was the fuel which met the standards of the day. Current Australian ultra low sulphur diesel (all diesel sold in Australia now meets this standard) is probably the best quality diesel in the world at present - the plants are all brand new (commissioned in 2006-2007), and in this industry, the newest plants make the best fuel. This fuel quality is the reason we are now seeing all those trendy European diesels being sold here.

Finally, there is an oversupply of petrol in the region, and a shortage of diesel (worldwide). That is why diesel costs more. You may not believe this, but Refiners have been selling petrol at a loss through most of 2008, and keeping the company running on the profit from diesel, jet and LPG.

Finally, sorry for the apparent bias- have been working in Refining for 22 years now, for two of the companies/Refineries mentioned above. You good folk have paid for my 98 Prado and offroad Windsor Rapid.

Thanks!
Happy to answer any technical questions that anyone may have about fuel production/Refining.

Thanks Len

You may be able to answer another question. I have been advised by several dealers to always use BP diesel in my Disco as BP provides much cleaner dieslel or something. Is this true??

When I fill up with BP at remote servos, am I actually getting BP??

Regards

so this means that the post somebody put up a while ago about BP charging more because it is better processed is crap and it is only more profitteering by fuel companies and sounds like that person was involved with fue[ trying to justify said money grab

steve

Just posting another response to the many queries and follow-ups posted since my earlier reply. All of you follow-ups are correct, and I applaud your knowledge of the industry. I'll just add a bit more detail, or in some cases more recent info. In no particular order:

Water in tanks- the big tanks at Refineries and at terminals are strictly controlled- the refinery tanks in fact have water bottoms in them (for stock control/working capital reasons), but the level of the water is known and controlled. They use water finding paste on a dip tape to measure the water level. The draw off nozzles are always well above the water level. If it wasn't, then a whole City full of servos would have a problem at once, not just the one servo. The old bushman's remedy is useful to know- add a bottle of metho to a tank if you have or suspect a water problem. Metho dissolves up the water and carries it safely through your fuel system and engine. Just digressing a bit- metho is in fact largely ethanol (which you can drink) which has been denatured (or made poisonous) by adding methanol. You will get severe brain damage if you drink it.
E10 unleaded is 10% ethanol, so should do this trick on it's own. It can't be stored in a water bottoms tank though, or the ethanol would soak up all the water. E10 is blended in terminal tanks.

Woolworths (and Coles)- both formed alliances several years ago, so that they could each have access to enough of the higher spec fuels which came in (petrol and diesel) in January 2007. Previously, they imported most of their fuel (or purchased from local refiners). Woolworths-Caltex, Coles- Shell. It was a close arrangement/marriage, with Woolies/Coles in many cases rebranding Caltex/Shell servos, and the Shell/Caltex convenience store arms in some cases becoming Coles/Woolies branded. Industry wisdom said that the Woolies/Coles shopper dockets would take over the market (which it has), so Caltex and Shell have been "winners" while BP and Mobil lost out. The volumes that Caltex and Shell sell are certainly higher due to these arrangements.

Special fuels- when a company introduces a "special" fuel, they have a problem logistically getting it all around the country. They have two possible methods. The easiest is to add a special additive at the terminal. They still buy the bulk fuel from the local refinery, then add magic ingredient X at the terminal. They need to do something if they are to legally claim a difference. These additives can range from higher detergent levels (cleans your fuel injectors), to E10 mentioned above, where the 10% ethanol is blended at the terminal. If they are selling an innately different product (eg. lower sulphur diesel, or higher octane petrol), then that has to come from a refinery. If you are the only mob making it, then you have to ship it to wherever you want to sell it. If the others make it, then you can buy it from them (if they will sell it to you). The early Shell Ultra High premium unleaded in the mid 90's was despatched originally from Sydney only, where they were blending in toluene purchased from overseas chemical plants to get the high octane. It must have cost them a fortune.

Clean diesel- Prior to January 2007, Australian spec diesel was 500 parts per million (ppm) sulphur. In Jan 2007, the spec dropped to 50 ppm sulphur with a further drop to 10 ppm due in a couple of years time (I can't recall the exact date). Those who installed the big expensive upgrades (BP, Caltex) designed them for 10 ppm diesel, while those who "did it on the cheap" (Mobil) aimed for the 50ppm. In Mobil's case, they shut down Adelaide Refinery and reduced the capacity of the Melbourne refinery by 40% to meet this at lower capital cost. Not sure what Mobil is planning to do when the 10ppm becomes compulsory.
There was a slight excise incentive for refiners who sell 10ppm diesel ahead of the mandatory date, so BP and Caltex went for it. Caltex is commissioning the final bit of their diesel refining capacity early next year, so will be able to make a lot more 10ppm diesel from then. In terms of what it means to your engine, I don't believe that the lower sulphur (below 50ppm) will in fact benefit your engine. The reduction in sulphur is to reduce pollution, not to make your diesel run better. Watch the advertising- it talks about cleaner and better for the environment. Sulphur is in fact a useful lubricant (like lead was in leaded petrol), so it could be argued that lower sulphur diesel is less lubricating. The comments about BP diesel hark back at least 20 years to a time when BP in Queensland was hydrotreating their diesel (the current and best treatment) while Ampol at the time weren't. In a short space of time, the Ampol stuff darkened and formed gums which clogged up injectors and filters. The Ampol stuff was always cheaper though...
Today, I don't believe that any diesel sold that meets the current spec is better or worse than any other.

Kevin J- that episode that you mentioned was where there were large sales of heating oil (which has no excise) into Queensland (where no one uses oil to heat their home). When combined with real diesel, it would have been fine to run your car on.They were getting it excise-free, then selling it at a handsome profit, and a discount. Everyone (except the Government) was winning on that one.

One final comment- do you recall when BP diesel caused all those diesel pump leaks a few years back? This came about because BP removed an impurity from their diesel. They paid out a lot of money in damages claims because they sold cleaner diesel. All the earlier diesel had a certain concentration of aromatic compounds (a strong solvent). Gaskets and seals in fuel pumps etc. which were not resistant to the aromatics would swell up (like rubber in petrol) when they contacted the aromatics. If those vehicles then changed over to BP diesel, then the lack of aromatics caused the seals to shrink and leak. Vehicles with aromatic-resistant seals, or seals which never saw the aromatics in the first place were fine.

Merry Christmas everyone.

On another tack, but related subject, what is the go with biodiesel blends? On another forum there is a discussion about various blends.
Apparently Freedom diesel has 20% bio. Most CRDi engine users specify 5%. The main problem appears to be that the blend is not prominently displayed, ie only small sticker on the pump, therefore you could be unknowingly be voiding warranty.

All very interesting.

So why then does my RA Rodeo perform a lot better using Shell diesel as opposed to the others.

On the "Tax Free" diesel in Qld, I inadvertantly found myself having a long talk with AFP & Customs on the matter about 16 yrs ago, when I was managing a natural gas field outside of Roma Q. Seems my company was selling natural gas condensate (about 2% of the natural gas makes up a heavy liquid which smells and acts like paint thinner) to a variety of what we thought were legitimate customers. Alas, it seems as one of them was using the condensate to mix with old ripped-up road bitumen. The mix of bitumen and condensate was then surreptiously used in fishing boats and eventually (but mysteriously) found itself blended into the 500 ppm diesel market. They were making a motza out of excise avoidance and no doubt contributed to a large number of injection system rebuilds (for some reason injectors don't take too kindly to having much bitumen flowing through them).