Refinery Strike Pushes Crude Prices Monday

Crude oil prices held close to stable on the New York Mercantile Exchange Monday, though a strike at a Scottish oil refinery kept the pressure on.

The strike at the Grangemouth refinery cut one-third of Britain’s North Sea oil flow. Crude prices, however, changed little on the day.

On the Exchange Monday, crude prices fell 8 cents to $118.83 per barrel.

Heating oil prices rose slightly in late trading, up 0.0012 cents to $3.30 per gallon. Reformulated gasoline blendstock prices fell 0.0007 cents to $3.03 per gallon. Natural gas prices fell 0.12 cents to $11.16 per million British thermal units.

At the pump, the national average for a gallon of unleaded gasoline in the United States rose to a record $3.603 per gallon Monday, from Sunday’s price of $3.599 per gallon, AAA said.