gas prices
 

I know gas is very expensive in Ireland. Is it sold by leter or gallion? Price?

1.106€ per litre = $5.19/gal

http://www.aaroadwatch.ie/petrolprices/

I don't know what petrol currently costs in Ireland, but as far as I know the US is the only country that hasn't converted to metrics (happy to be corrected on that, though). That's not to say that some older people may not refer to the old scales sometimes. In Australia you may still hear someone described as being 6' tall, even though the police, media etc will always say "183 cm", and for that matter a "44 gallon drum". Come to think of it, I still pump my car tyres up to 32 psi. But nobody thinks in anything but litres when buying petrol, milk etc, or in anything but kg when buying meat, fruit etc.

If you do hear anyone talking about gallons, be aware that the US gallon is smaller than the British or "imperial" gallon. For the record, 1 U.S. gal. = 3.785 litres,
1 imp. gal. = 4.536 litres.

If everywhere that used Imperial gallons has gone metric, isn't that distinction moot?

"... but as far as I know the US is the only country that hasn't converted to metrics (happy to be corrected on that, though)."

Neil_Oz, you should pop up and see us in Canada. We started to convert to the metric system some decades ago, but our leadership lost its nerve. So, we buy our fuel in litres, and measure automobile efficiency in litres per hundred kilometres. Road distances are in kilometres, as are our speed limits.

This all sounds very sane until you go to the grocery store. Milk products seem to be sold by the litre, but canned goods are labelled in both metric and imperial measure. (I just lifted a can of crushed tomatoes off the pantry shelf. It says 796mL and 28 fl oz on the label.) The butcher speaks both metric and imperial. One customer will ask for a pound of ground beef and the next one will ask for 250 grams of sliced ham. His scales display both systems, as does the label he prints for the package.

We measure temperature in degrees Celsius and meaure windspeed in kilometres per hour, unless you are an mariner or an aviator. My plumber installs half-inch pipe, my local building supply store sells "2 by 4s," but my daughter measures her height in centimetres and her weight in kilograms. Being an old guy, I have gotten used to metric speeds and distances and have learned to think of buying food in metric measurements, but I cook the food in imperial. Oh, I am also 5 foot 6 inches tall and weigh too many pounds.

Anselm

"If everywhere that used Imperial gallons has gone metric, isn't that distinction moot?"

Yes. We may ask for (and get) a pint of beer, describe someone as 5' 10" or use two ounces of butter to make a roux. But the whole petrol selling system is metric, and you never ask for x litres or gallons anyway.

But that doesn't stop the media batting on about the price per (real, not childsize) gallon whenever it makes a good headline. In Ireland, they're getting close to the €10 per gallon point that'll bring out the tabloids' special editions.

As I recall, one of the spurs for converting petrol to litres in the UK (aside from the metrification programme itself) was that prices were approaching £1/gal, and pumps were unable to deal with amounts above two digits. Now that prices are approaching £1/litre, will that again be a problem? Or do the new pumps have that capability?

BTW, I still track my petrol consumption in mpg, and use a calculator for the 4.546 conversion.

Anselm, I'm looking forward to investigating the situation in person (in BC and Alberta anyway) this coming September.

I feel your pain at the supermarket - conversion is a bit like pulling sticking plaster off your skin, best done quickly. Not that we've been 100% successful, but at least nobody asks for a pound of anything any more, which is something. We converted in the '70s, perhaps emboldened by having switched to decimal currency a decade earlier.

I think I read that the Swedes switched over to driving on the RH side of the road some years back. I don't like to think what would happen if we tried that here.

" think I read that the Swedes switched over to driving on the RH side of the road some years back."

Make that more like 40 years ago.

"...price per (real, not childsize) gallon..."

<i>Real</i> gallons - from the folks that brought you furlongs, gills, and hogsheads. At least they got rid of crowns and guineas.

Petrol in Dublin is currently anywhere between &euro;1.13 - &euro;1.25 per Ltr.

Thank you, Lucielou for finally answering the only real question which was asked.

<b><font color="BLUE">HEY!</font></b>

Author: Robespierre
Date: 04/26/2006, 06:35 pm

1.106&euro; per litre = $5.19/gal

http://www.aaroadwatch.ie/petrolprices/

My name is not Hey, and i'm telling people thats what i paid to fill my car up yesterday in dublin....i live here so i'm hardly making it up!!

Your welcome Intrepid

Intrepid, I apologize if my efforts fell short of your expectations. I did my best to research the question and post a link to a (presumably) authoritative source. You're welcome.

Jay Leno said on the Tonight Show last night that gasoline is $8 per gallon (not sure if he said Germany or where) - - is this true?

It has been my observation that as gasoline prices have doubled in the US (whether you mean from 1 dollar to 2, or from 1.50 to 3)... that European gas prices have risen at a slower pace (perhaps because the &quot;price&quot; is more predominantly made up by tax in Europe, and onoly partially driven by the price of the fuel itself).

Is there really $7 (or $8) gasoline in Europe? (i.e., 1.65+ euro per liter?)

Or any other observations?

Best wishes,

Rex

rex, I don´t know. But I live in Finland and we usually have just about the most expensive gasoline in Europe. I filled yesterday and payed 1,37 &euro; per litre. So in dollars it would be a bit more still.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&amp;q...ars+per+gallon

yields

6.44517841 U.S. dollars per US gallon

Nowhere close to &quot;8 dollars per gallon&quot;.

I think that Mr. Leno does not qualify as a veteran &quot;Euro-dite&quot;, in this case.

Petrol is now occasionally costing &pound;1 a litre. By no means everywhere, but no longer at just the odd isolated place in the sticks.

At &pound;1=$1.78 and 1 gallon=4.5 litres, that makes $8.01 and upwards.

For a real gallon, of course. Mr Leno clearly understands Europe rather better than many on this board.

&lt;&lt; Mr Leno clearly understands Europe rather better than many on this board. &gt;&gt;

Then he is way ahead of 99% of audience...

But of course, if you have ever seen &quot;Jaywalking&quot;... you know that questions like &quot;When was the War of 1812?&quot; are also quite the challenge!

Interestingly enough, the Oxford Dictionary of English defines a &quot;real gallon&quot; as a unit of liquid measure equal to 3.7854117 litres.

And to muddy things a bit...my experience with car rentals in Europe is that they get a lot better gas mileage, so when you are thinking &quot;gee, I'm going to need a few extra punts&quot; you may not need as many as you think.

Long live Google!

1.37 eur/l in $/gal

also works

Thank you all for your help.
Donna

Here in New Zealand our petrol has just reached an all time high.
NZ$1.73 a litre for premium and NZ$1.76 a litre for super. It hurts!!!!!