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To: Aggie who wrote (169816)	12/8/2008 2:52:26 PM
From: Elroy Jetson	Respond to of 306849

Distillation of diesel conserves the volume of the crude, while cracking the oil into gasoline creates more volume. So the opposite of your assumption is true. The average U.S. refinery use 42 gallons of crude oil (one barrel) to produce 44.2 gallons of refined product. 19.5 gallons of gasoline _9.2 gallons of distillate fuel oil (diesel fuel and home-heating oil) _4.1 gallons of kerosene-type jet fuel _0.2 gallons kerosene _2.3 gallons of residual / bunker fuel oil In addition, many of Chevron's refineries increase the number of gallons produced from crude oil with the addition of natural gas as an additional feedstock in the cracking process. Natural gas cannot be added to increase the quantity of diesel in the distillation process. .

To: Aggie who wrote (169816)	12/8/2008 3:33:17 PM
From: Peter V	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 306849

Your second question does not completely follow the first. Elroy is right, gasoline is about 18 percent less dense than diesel, so gasoline yields more VOLUME from the crude than diesel. (the more complex answer includes a discussion of shorter molecular chains produced by cracking and other boring stuff so that volume actually increases during refining). CONSUMPTION, on the other hand, is affected by many things, including the amount of energy stored in a given volume. Diesel fuel has a higher energy density than gasoline. On average, 1 gallon (3.8 L) of diesel fuel contains approximately 155x106 joules (147,000 BTU), while 1 gallon of gasoline contains 132x106 joules (125,000 BTU). This, combined with the improved efficiency of diesel engines, explains why diesel engines get better mileage than equivalent gasoline engines. I don't know how the volume and energy calculations play out, whether the increase in volume for gasoline is overcome by the extra energy contained in diesel.