Premium gasoline sales up 64 percent

Skyrocketing gas prices are adding to the headaches of ordinary Korean drivers, but there has been a rise in the sales of more costly premium gasoline, largely due to the growing popularity of imported vehicles.
According to the Korea Petroleum Association, four Korean oil refiners ― SK Corp., GS Caltex Corp., S-Oil Corp. and Hyundai Oil Bank Co. ― sold 194,900 barrels of premium gasoline during the first four months of this year, up 64 percent from a year ago. By contrast, during the same time span, the sales of ordinary gasoline were up only 4 percent to 19.6 million barrels.
Due to the increase, premium gasoline’s part of the market pie has neared 1 percent.
In the United States and Japan, it makes up more than 20 percent of the entire gasoline market.
Premium gasoline costs about 100 to 150 won per liter more than ordinary gasoline because of its higher octane level.
Higher octane contained in premium gasoline improves engine performance and reduces noise, oil refiners claim.
Octane levels are a measure of a gasoline’s ability to resist knocking from uncontrolled combustion.
But some oil experts say the performance gap between ordinary and premium gasoline is not as big as drivers generally assume. That is because the quality of commonplace gasoline is already “very good” and has an optimum portion of octane.
Despite this, the demand for premium gasoline is constantly on the rise, the petroleum association said, as more Koreans buy import vehicles.
“Drivers of foreign vehicles and some costly Korean-made sedans tend to think they should feed pricey and ‘high-quality’ gasoline into their vehicles,” said a spokesman with the association.
And the market for the high-end fuel will continue growing, he predicted.
Riding the wave of premium gasoline’s popularity, refiners are scrambling to increase the number of gas stations that supply premium gasoline. SK Corp., for example, has set a plan to have 400 such stations by the end of this year, up from 267 last year.
Refiners are also beefing up marketing efforts, offering gift certificates and other freebees to premium gasoline customers and launching more TV commercials for the target audience.

By Seo Ji-eun Staff Writer [spring@joongang.co.kr]