Several months ago, The Barrel sat in on a session at the spring meeting of the Society of Independent Gasoline Marketers of America in which the topic of temperature compensation was discussed.
Gasoline marketers at the meeting were not happy about the prospect of needing to install new equipment to adjust for the fact that at warmer temperatures, gasoline expands and the amount of energy delivered in a gallon is reduced. So what a retail pump measures as a gallon in summer does not necessarily contain the same volume of gasoline as in winter. In just about a year, it had become a significant consumer issue, spurred in part by reporting in The Kansas City Star, which raised the specter that consumers were being ripped off.
But this week, the National Conference on Weights and Measures, which would govern such issues, deferred any action on requiring retail outlets to install equipment that adjusts for temperature compensation, whether in warm or cold weather. There was significant support for it among the members, meeting in Salt Lake City, but not enough to mandate a change.
The issue isn't going away. NCWM chairwoman Judy Cardin said in a prepared the statement that "automatic temperature compensation is our top priority this year." It will almost certainly be for gasoline marketers as well.
Isn't it that at _cooler_ temperatures, gasoline contracts?
And even if gasoline expands and contracts with the temperature, consumers are still getting a gallon of gas as advertised, so no one is getting ripped off. And we're talking about a 1% difference in the energy content of said gallon from summer to winter -- not enough of a difference for me to be worried about.
Thanks, Aaron. Yes, it was described incorrectly, and the entry has been changed.