Featured Gas Prices Shrink as Inventory Swells

With prices down at the pump I find myself driving faster and using power mode! My last fillup average 34.8 mpg.

 

I need some help ...I predicted $1 by Feb_16 but the prediction is not looking good at the moment.

 

When we look at the switch to winter blend that has already occured, and should be felt in lower prices and lower mpg

Looking at refinery maintenance, its not a problem in most of the country. Maintenance in the midwest should be ending soon Only the west coast has higher prices because of refineries, and this should continue through november but not december.

That leaves us with oil prices, and oil is getting pumped but stored in this country in hopes that prices go up, and they can sell it later for more money. These high inventory levels are keeping prices high. Production will eventually fall in North America and prices will go up, but that won't happen by January. Expect gas to stay low, for the next few months.

 

crude has been hovering in the low 40's while gas is probably dropping due to the season as bob mentioned.

 

No disagreement there, but some thought the US would cut back production enough to increase the price of crude. The big inventories kept the prices of crude down, which is responsible for low prices in most of the country.

 

I last filled up my plug-in back in late Feb @ $1.86 and have been waiting to hopefully fill again at that same price; currently at $1.89 locally.

Low fuel prices are a double edged sword for me since on one hand it's great for my wallet but it hurts both the local and state economy. The latter not as much as before since the state has diversified including a lot of wind generation. Here's some more giant blades being loaded onto train cars waiting at the port.

 

Gas was $1.899/gallon on 1/1/15. The low was $1.719 on 1/29/15 with a high of $2.499 on 6/8/15 and back down to $1.759 on 10/26/15. All prices are from local NJ gas stations. These low prices are killing me.

It takes a long time for exploration & production cuts to be reflected in the supply and demand has been weaker than expected. I don't see much improvement in 2016 and 2017 may not be much better.

 

Well how about adding +25 cent gaso tax in NJ?
Article on GasBuddy suggests it's almost certain, but I do not know.

 

Sure, when they lower the property taxes, the state income taxes, the tolls.....

 

nevermind. are you saying christy left the state in a mess?

 

The taxes were in effect before Christie.

 

and he ignored them?

 

The state senate and assembly are Democrat run.

 

ah, that explains it. sounds like the 25 cents will probably go through.

 

It was a mess before he arrived and it'll be a mess when he leaves--probably a bigger one.

 

Late February??

Doesn't gas go bad after a while..? 8 months seems like quite a while..

Or do you put startron or some type of fuel additive / stabilizer in your tank to help?

 

PHEV's have built in safeguards for this. First, the fuel tanks are pressurized to keep oxidation of the gas at a minimum and secondly there are fuel and oil maintenance modes that will start up the ICE if it hasn't been run in "x" weeks. With Ford, I believe it is six weeks but I've never encountered one. I do enough periodic out of town trips (at least one a month) to exercise the ICE enough. Oil change is 2yrs/20k miles whichever comes first.

I am thinking about adding sta-bil to this next tank for piece of mind.

 

I don't use sta-bil any more. Just had to rebuild a carb on a lawn mower because I had used it.

 

really? i always use it. what happened?