Quote:
Originally Posted by mav1178
CA mandates 91 octane as minimum for premium. It's up to the market to offer whatever that meets that spec (and usually the market will only offer the minimum spec).
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I don't think that's true. I drive all over Florida. The statutory minimum here is 91. All top tier stations sell 93, and it's rare to find an off-brand that doesn't have it. I suspect it's the same in most states where there's a statutory minimum. I also frequently drive in several states that have no statutory minimum, and I have no problem finding 93 there either. If the market usually moves to the minimum octane, these states should be offering 90 or 91 and calling it premium. They don't.
California gets 91 because your idiot government banned certain octane boosters, making 93 more expensive to produce. Meanwhile, most of your gas comes from a single pipeline owned by Kinder Morgan, which colluded with the distributors to provide only 91 at the lower cost and stop shipping higher octane gas. If there were competition offering 93, Kinder Morgan would have to offer it also to compete. Lucky them that they don't have to.
In Florida we don't have your regulatory overreach, so the cost to produce 93 wasn't unnaturally raised for our suppliers. And our gas arrives by ship into multiple ports from a variety of suppliers rather than just one effective monopoly. Out here in America we still have competition, so most stations provide 93 to compete.