The Irish Mitsubishi FTO Owners Club

Hi there,

Just wondering what the general feeling is on the possibility of an oil crisis in the next couple of years, how it will affect the use as well as the value of our cars and how the motoring industry will get over it?

I mean, are we gonna see petrol going to 2 euro a litre? Are cars over 2 litres in size going to be impossible to own and re sell? I am sure the motor industry will adapt to keep selling cars, but I am not seeing much evidence of realistic alternatives to petrol that will still provide us with our performance fix.

Opinions and predictions please!

A

I do not belive a genuine crisis is pending. Oil is currently artificically high for a number of reasons:
The unrest between Turkey and Iran -the main geo political reason for the recent surge in oil prices.
Oil is priced in USD and the weekening of the dollar has made oil more affordable for traders dealing in other currencies. This has stiulated demand driving up the price -making it less affordable
The other factor is the turbulance on world stock markets. Due to the volatility in the markets the large hedge funds have sought to invest in alternatives -such as oil.
These factors combined have caused teh recent surge in prices, and have nothing to do with the basic economic laws of supply and demand which in an ideal world world dictate the price -which as a result would be lower. In any case most of the price of petrol is made up of taxes, In the event of a genuine crisis the government could aways reduce theri cut to maintain prices at current levels. -unlikely

I have to agree 100% here. The fundamental laws of Keynesian economics cannot be applied here. This isn;t the same as the 1973 oil crisis that led directly to the creation of the hatchback market and the launch of the mk3 escort and the VW golf. They turned off production. demand was hugely outstripping supply. As a consequence France built 58 nuclear reactors so they would never again be dependent on oil. They were caught out big time. I think we all have that much money now (so Im told) we could easily absorb a huge rise in oil and petrol prices, up to 1.50 a litre. I don't think it will go that high though. So unless the Arabs turn off the taps it will be sustainable. The problem is what happens with the Iran question... The rumour is that its gonna be GW Bush's swansong to hit Iran. The US ain't leaving Iraq anytime soon for the reason that it provides a nice buffer zone between Iran and Israel. Will be an interesting 2008. I'll still have my FTO. even if I had to drive around hijacking statoil trucks ala mad max just to keep it running on the dusty unused car-free motorways of the future

Mad Max in Ireland in an FTO... now that'd be a film!

I blame politicians..

I blame Bush

I put €62 worth of petrol in my car this morning and that wasn't filling it to the brim. This is making it a fairly expensive proposition to run in and out of work but it's balanced by the fact that I love the FTO and am willing to pay over the odds for it.
Obviously, if petrol costs keep rising not only will it become harder to justify the FTO as a runabout but the economy will tighten as the costs of almost everything also rises and I will have less cash etc

But for the moment I will grumble about the artificially high oil prices but keep filling my tank.

I think that it will have a bit of an effect on the resale values though.

Oil prices move closer to $100-a-barrel mark

Wednesday November 07 2007

Oil prices have hit a new record high today, moving ever closer to the $100-a-barrel mark.

Prices surpassed $97-a-barrel for the second consecutive day today due to concerns about supply heading into the high-demand winter period.

Some commentators are predicting that the prices will reach $100-a-barrel before the end of the week.

When you think of the trouble that truckers have with defending their fuel tanks, I think the days of people nicking your petrol aren't far off again.

Mustang wrote:I do not belive a genuine crisis is pending. Oil is currently artificically high for a number of reasons:
The unrest between Turkey and Iran -the main geo political reason for the recent surge in oil prices.
Oil is priced in USD and the weekening of the dollar has made oil more affordable for traders dealing in other currencies. This has stiulated demand driving up the price -making it less affordable
The other factor is the turbulance on world stock markets. Due to the volatility in the markets the large hedge funds have sought to invest in alternatives -such as oil.
These factors combined have caused teh recent surge in prices, and have nothing to do with the basic economic laws of supply and demand which in an ideal world world dictate the price -which as a result would be lower. In any case most of the price of petrol is made up of taxes, In the event of a genuine crisis the government could aways reduce theri cut to maintain prices at current levels. -unlikely

Unforuntatley it's these very factors that may continue to push up the price of oil. When it comes to trading commodities the laws of supply and demand don't always come into play - the markets can be manipulated to suit - many of these hedge funds are trying to recoup losses suffered through the sub-prime crisis in the states by getting into the obvious commidities like oil and gold. The end result could be a lot of funds that need the price of oil to stay high..... it woudn't suprise me if petrol did hit e2.00 a litre.

Look at it in Germany I think its around E1.50 isnt it?
A mate of mine a few years ago had a diesal Laguna, so he bought his own tank and got it filled every so often. Had his own pump in the back yard, saved a fortune. Dont know if you can do that for petrol though.

Dragonheart wrote:Look at it in Germany I think its around E1.50 isnt it?
A mate of mine a few years ago had a diesal Laguna, so he bought his own tank and got it filled every so often. Had his own pump in the back yard, saved a fortune. Dont know if you can do that for petrol though.

yeah you probably need some sort of license to store 100 litre or more of flammable fuel at your residence.