Refinery count

Refinery Stats can be found by putting in each state and manually counting up.

Montana: 4 Refineries
Wyoming: 5 Refineries
Virginia: 2 Refineries

So How much does a person pay per gallon per refinery?

Montana: 2.11$/g / 4 Refineries = 0.52$/g per Refinery
Wyoming: 1.98$/g / 5 Refineries = 0.39$/g per Refinery
Virginia: 1.81$/g / 2 Refineries = 0.90$/g per Refinery

So, clearly, Virginia's low gas price isn't related to their sheer number of Refineries. And being landlocked isn't a big factor as Wyoming is as landlocked as Montana in relation to sea ports. Could another refinery make up for the difference? Probably, as it would be a drop of about (2.11/5 - 0.39) 0.03$ per gallon per refinery.

Gas Costs across the states.

Ok the 2003 average wages were (according to the National Census):

Montana: 34,375 USD
Wyoming: 41501 USD
Virginia: 52,587 USD

Given the 2.3% national growth we have the following, assuming wages grew at least as much as inflation:

Montana: 35,165 USD
Wyoming: 42,455 USD
Virginia: 53,796 USD

Now lets say that we have a family in each state that uses 10 gallons of gas per week or 520 gallons per year.

Montana will shell out 1097$ or about 3.11% of their wages per year.
Wyoming will shell out 1029$ or about 2.42% of their wages per year.
Virginia will shell out 941$ or about 1.74% of their wages per year.

Ok, yeah, looks like either a vast shortage of refineries is to blame, or being the 41st in income and yet being almost #1 in tourism helps to keep Montanan's with less in their pockets than others.

Cheap Gas

So today I was checking out Cheap Gas. It's a really neat site that combines data with google's map. The data that it uses is that of gas prices and then the locations of places.

Ok, bottom line. Montana cheapest: 2.11$/gl Viriginia: 1.81$/gl. Yeah this makes sense. I mean totally. Virginians have to drive a few miles to work each day, and the average commute in Montana is like 10-20 miles. One way.

Wyoming? $1.98. Ok, it's starting to sound like Montana is getting it in the shorts as a tourist state.

Maybe someone should do a price comparison of per capita and gas costs. I bet you dollars to donuts that Montana is having to shell out the most per gallon.

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