Oil Prices Ignore Production Increase

Crude oil prices climbed to more than $136 a barrel Monday on the New York Mercantile Exchange in spite of a promise from Saudi Arabia to pump more oil.

Saudi Arabian officials repeated their intention Sunday to bump production by 200,000 barrels a day to 9.7 million barrels but the announcement didn’t keep prices from rising.

Oil prices jumped $1.27 to $136.63 per barrel Monday in New York. The price of heating oil also rose, up 0.0448 cents to $3.8165 per gallon. Reformulated blendstock gasoline prices rose 0.0118 cents to $3.458 per gallon. Natural gas prices rose 0.168 cents to $13.162 per million British thermal units.

At the pump, the national average price for a gallon of unleaded gasoline fell slightly, down 0.001 cent to $4.072 per gallon, AAA said.