Have you noticed the increase in cost for plastic pipe/conduit? :eek2 I've been away all week & haven't checked the places i usually buy from, but was at Home Depot last Sunday & prices have almost tripled for PVC conduit, 4" S&D was $2.00 more @ $6.10/10' elec. wire is going up because of the cost of the insulating material.....i understand the fire at one resin plant in Texas and the hurricane damage at others is causing this.
we bought 8" SDR 35-3034 sewer pipe from last year to mid summer here for $2.40-$2.65 a ft. Just bought 1800' for a development job we're starting next week, $3.30...what a shocker!. Guess we can only pass those costs on.
I picked up some 4"x10' drainfield pipe at two different stores a mile apart and it was $5.50 at one store and $9.60 at the other store :eek2 That's another $100 for a typical drainfield around here!
10' of 4" sch. 40 PVC solid core @ Lowes today = $18.00 :eek2
Holy crap!!! I'm going to have to rebid a couple jobs!! Has anyone seen a similar rise in fittings?
Yep, just bought some 4'' drain at 6.10$ at Home Depot. Can you believe they sell it for 14$ + in Kodiak, AK. at Spenards? Talk about gouging.
That is a significant change. I thought steel proces were outrageous.
I recall some of the news stories about the oil price increases due to the storms predicted this. I believe they said the byproducts of refining oil are what is used to produce plastics, so the lost refining from the storms created a shortage & the consequent rise in prices. Hopefully this will be temporary until the refining capacity catches up again?
The damage to oil infrastucture in the gulf is much worse than they are letting on. There are a lot of rigs that are destroyed in some way (around 100), 50 others need to be fixed in order for crews to return. A bunch of rigs also came loose and their anchors tore up underwater pipelines. The refinery problem makes things even worse. Refinery capacity was tight even before the two hurricanes. Fuel demand in the summer was higher than expected and refineries had to focus on making gas and diesel, when they should have been stocking up on heating oil and other products. Also gas stocks are not as full as they should be at this time of year. The release of oil from the SPR helps to calm the markets, but without the necessary refinery capacity it will not be 100% effective. Also the oil companies do not get it for free but now owe the SPR oil + interest, which will act like an increase in demand for oil in the future. On top of all this, a lot of the added oil production from OPEC has been of the "heavy sour" variety, which our refineries are not set up to handle in the same volume as "light sweet" crude (refinery fires). The "light sweet" crude is ideally what we want for refining. The "heavy sour" crude can be up to 33% sulfur, which is all waste. This is reflected in the price of oil. The price that is seen on NYMEX, $65/barrel for example, is for the "light sweet" crude. We had seen a run up in its price, because production is in decline and it is going to the highest bidder. The "heavy sour" crude is still plentiful and is trading around $40/barrel, but because a lot of it is wasted, you need to buy more of it to get the same amount of finished product. Try to imagine the price and effects will be when ALL grades of oil go into decline and you will have trouble sleeping at night. We have not really seen the full effects of all this reflected in the prices of all oil related products yet, but give it time. Also pray that this isn't a cold winter or demand could excede supply :spaz , not a good thing unless you have oil to sell. I heard a guy that owns 3 gas stations say that the price of gas at the pumps now is is based on oil that was bought when it was $45/barrel. He was given order forms for the numbers 3,4,5 for his signs. The gas was almost $3/gallon for him to buy. Sorry for the novel, but I think this is an important topic that will affect everyone in the coming years.
Well said Cat. Ive been noticing everything including insulation, wood by the cord, wood stoves and everything else that makes heat is going up. Its going to be a long expensive winter for everyone. I just bought some new metalbestos stack (mine was rotted through from stack fires), 135$ for an 8'', 3' section. Had to replace 7', ouch!! Still, better than having to heat with fuel oil only. Thankfully I get wood for free. Thats the only brightside to all this.
As Steve said, I had to adjust the price of a small drainage job today. I ended up with a materials cost of about 50% more then I originally accounted for.