Theo_Fidel wrote:Actually, jet fuel is fairly cheap Napthene/Paraffin oils. The expensive stuff is the military aviation fuels. JP-5 in particular is a blend used in the SR-71 black-bird. It is a special mix that will not ignite even if you put a lighter flame to it as long as it is not atomized. The SR-71's tanks at normal temperature leak like a sieve and the only thing that keeps it safe is the resistance to combustion of the fuel.
JP-7 for the SR-71 is an extra special blend and is not a distilled fuel, which is so rare and demand so low that it has to be seriously expensive.
The rest of the Jet fuels like the plain vanilla Jet A and Jet A1 types are easily available and are basically Kerosene type fuels.
Supply of cheap Kerosene is something I reluctantly support. It is not a large amount. I remember reading 10 years ago that it was less than the Petrol used in Delhi alone or something similar.
No.. The kerosene and diesel subsidies are the largest share of non food and fertilizer subsidies, and I think fuel subsidies are close to 10% of the budget . The diff between Kerosene and diesel is quite large now.
In rural areas the supply of cheap Kerosene and now Gas cylinders is the only thing keeping the people from stripping the land bare for firewood. At one time we were in serious danger of turning into Haiti. India is slowly greening up as the once huge demand for firewood and dung cakes has slowly reduced.
Yes. That is the point I am making. One way to reduce the subsidy is to switch completely from Kerosene to LPG. That way ,the Kerosene demand would go down (bulk of it is anyway leached away to aduletrate the very close distillate diesel (and also petrol to a lesser extend, but you can replace a pretty decent part of diesel with kerosene), and you cut the subsidy bill by replacing a more expensive and dirty fuel with a cheaper and cleaner on.
That said there has got be a better way to supply it than use our Dinosaur PSU's and disastrous PDS system.
If you look back in history and see how the LPG shortages in India disappeared (now you get next to less than a 3 /4 day delivery in Indane here in Bangalore, you just have to call the automated IVR system to order, with private guys like Shakti, Elf etc, it is off the shelf!) are a thing of the past, you just have to go back to a giant start up refinery in Gujarat circa 1996 or so and that is when it happened.
The LPG shortages of yore were largely due to lack of capacity in the refineries and lack of bottling plants ! Classic case of underinvestment and shortage economy of a "command " economy.