End sought to overcharges

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The Star in August reported that consumers were being overcharged an estimated $2.3 billion a year at then-current prices for gasoline and diesel because of the hot-fuel phenomenon. That figure also accounted for fuel that is sold below 60 degrees in the United States. Even with the recent drop in gasoline prices, hot fuel still amounts to about $1.7 billion a year at current prices.

The named plaintiffs are more than a dozen consumers and truck drivers in the seven states who allegedly were sold fuel that was warmer than the industry standard of 60 degrees, which gave them less energy per gallon. If the lawsuits are granted class-action status by the courts, then other consumers and truckers in those states would also be covered. Potentially, they could recover the extra money they paid for hot fuel.

The cost of hot fuel to a typical California household, for instance, can amount to about $50 a year. For long-haul truckers, who average about 100,000 miles per year, the amount can be several hundred dollars per year.

"It's hard enough for us to make a living out here the way it is," said Becky Rush, the wife of Mark Rush, a Louisiana trucker who is one of the named plaintiffs.

The Owner-Operator Independent Drivers Association in Grain Valley, which represents 147,000 truckers, came out in support of the lawsuit.

"With this suit, reasonable-thinking people will debate the issues surrounding this unfair practice in a free and open debate," said John Siebert, a project manager for the trucking group's foundation.

The case laid out in the two lawsuits describes temperature, price and volume as interdependent in calculating the value of motor fuel and that the oil industry has long been aware of the important role that temperature played in that relationship.

The story of hot fuel traces all the way back to oil magnate John D. Rockefeller.

In the early 1900s, according to the lawsuits, the Standard Oil Trust had difficulty in accounting for inventory credits to partners that owned oil wells because of how temperature affected the volume. Standard Oil financed research by the American Petroleum Institute to create a standard unit to measure petroleum products. The institute then went to the federal National Bureau of Standards for assistance. The outcome of those discussions was the 60-degree standard.

The standard was accepted by the industry and is used by other groups and federal agencies. The U.S. Bureau of Customs, for example, requires that duties on imported petroleum products be calculated on gallons adjusted to the 60-degree standard. And the Federal Trade Commission requires the same measure be used for packaged petroleum products, such as 3-In-One Oil.

But oil companies and retailers have refused to do so for retail sales of gasoline and diesel, even though the technology exists. According to the lawsuits, that is because the oil industry and retailers make more money by not adjusting for temperature at the retail pump in the United States, since the average fuel temperature is above the industry standard.

A database compiled by the National Institute for Standards and Technology found that the average temperature of retail fuel nationwide and year-round averages almost 65 degrees. As a result, consumers and truckers end up spending billions of dollars per year on fuel that they wouldn't have had to pay for if gallons had been adjusted to the 60-degree standard.

"Because the petroleum industry profits from the sale of hot motor fuel to consumers ... the industry has repeatedly fought efforts to require the installation of temperature compensation equipment at retail fuel pumps in the U.S.," according to the lawsuits.

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