Hopefully the delivery issues don't imply that any bus, railway or other service vehicle depots will be running dangerously low on diesel. Unfortunately of course lots of delivery vans etc have pretty much just got to sit in the queues with everyone else which isn't ideal.
Depends how good the depot delivery systems are. It's all about cash-flow.
When bulk fuel is ordered (whether by a forecourt retailer, railway or other) the fuel is paid for at the point of delivery or before. Then it's sold over time. Where demand is predictable and fuel available on a next-day basis it's easy to keep the fuel in-fuel out levels balanced- so the tanks don't run dry AND also so there's not much cash tied up in unsold fuel.
That is actually why the BP forecourts were having problems originally- when they had to wait a week between deliveries it was harder to predict and they didn't want cash tied up in unsold fuel so they didn't always get it right- so ran dry. (This was really a non-story blown up by ITV and BBC to create a crisis to promote a Remainiac agenda, but that's another issue; the original BBC website report was actually correct and low-key but the headline was clickbait and panic-inducing).
Where trains are serviced regularly, there will be a known level of use and a regular delivery schedule....... so unlikely to be an issue. A problem might arise if a bunch of trains got out of pattern due to an incident and ended up at a different depot to usual. All depends on how tight things are being run, especially if the depot also lets freight locos fill up there too.
Isn't the real underlying problem the fallacy of 'Just In Time' logistics; that's simply too fragile to deal with the unexpected. There have been many examples exposing this since the start of the Pandemic.
Filled up on the motorway on the way home last night, plenty of Diesel available but only two pumps had BP Ultimate petrol left. I'm working away this week so have enough for that, then I'm on holiday so hopefully it is sorted by the time I get back.
Resilience and emergency planning is unpopular because you needs to spend money without seeing immediate return- like an insurance policy, no-one likes paying but everyone is glad they had it when a mishap occurs and it pays out.
I'm not sure about the practicalities of building tanks large enough to hold several weeks' supply at every petrol station?
You don't necessarily need bigger tanks at existing fuel stations- just more of them (and under control of those who need them). Why does every ambulance station, Fire Station, Police HQ and Local Authority Highways depot not have their own fuel tanks? I'll tell you why; the top brass would rather spend money on "diversity officers" and on being all "engaged" rather than on the nuts and bolts of delivering a resilient service. Usual politricks which lets down the front line. Once upon a time not so long ago, they would all have had their own fuel systems.
In the last fuel crisis, I worked in mid-Wales. In those days, the Local Authority Highways dept had fuel tanks in every depot- as they needed a reliable supply particularly for winter salting. So they made that available to the local Emergency Services. But that fuel system was relatively unusual, even then most LAs had got rid of or were getting rid of tanks rather than maintain and replace them as they aged. Thing is, if the Elected Members have a choice between a few more books in schools or paying to secure infrastructure resilience inevitably the emotions will win and it'll be books in schools (or another emotive issue) any day.
There's also far fewer fuel stations that before- just look at how many became second-hand car dealers or fix-it garages- because the big supermarkets undercut their margins (the big supermarkets were often selling fuel at a lower price than these small forecourts could buy it for). Plus the regulations for underground tanks are onerous (and above-ground tanks need space and new planning permission which in a built-up area might be difficult to obtain).
The signs up at some petrol stations say that HGV and emergency vehicle drivers can go inside the shop to ask to pay for more than £30 worth of fuel which will be allowed. Obviously at the unstaffed filling stations I don't know what they do.
I take issue with this sort of "fuel rationing." Like the emotive response which tends to prevent proper resilience spend, it's all very well to gush over helping "Doctors and Teachers" jump the queue, but they won't be able to do much if the lights go out because power workers cannot fix faults or food is not delivered to supermarkets. And are ALL of the HGV journeys being done strictly necessary or could they wait a day or two? There were plenty HGVs on the M42 and M5 today and I doubt very much they were ALL carrying "essential" supplies like food. Perhaps the local care worker or the local Train Driver needs the diesel more than the truck with a container of garden furniture on it......?
There's also some rather more "essential" things than (say) the local school or GP- starting with electricity, gas, water and sewage infrastructure, food deliveries and blue-light services.
I do wonder if all the Category 1 responders in the Civil Contingencies Act 2004 actually have "failure of fuel availability" in their Risk Assessments; even if they did, one could argue their mitigations were obviously unsuccessful and they have failed in one of their core duties.
Can I ask a question without looking a bit dim?
Where do diesel trains get their fuel?
I know they don't go to the petrol station (obviously) but are they dependent on tanker deliveries? Or is it delivered through pipelines, like aviation fuel?
Road tankers to train maintenance depots. Big fuel tanks, with dispensing pumps- fueling roads with the correct dispensing fittings for the units/locos using the system. Can also have the tanking facility on the same pad, put the train in and fuel/tank it. (I was involved in the upgrade of such a depot facility a year or few back). Pretty sure most if not all use road tankers.
Basically- resilience costs money.
The current fuel crisis is primarily a media/RHA construct by Remainers with an agenda to take political advantage of the fact that for 20 years successive govts have run down resilience and robustness- the "peace dividend" and it all started when the Berlin Wall came down. Blair was the PFI artist, although Thatcher started the "externalization" of Local Authority based services, Blair continued it with a vengeance and often the stuff lost was the infrastructure needed for resilience like fuel systems.
Finally- the media has been very silent on the role of DVLA and the PCS union on the HGV driver situation. DVLA is in a hack of a state and the sooner the heads of DVLA management and the PCS whingers are banged together and they start behaving like grown-ups the better.
TPO
