Oil, Gas, Product Prices All Climbing

The loss of Gulf of Mexico petroleum production to Hurricane Katrina raised the New York price of high-quality crude oil for October delivery Tuesday to $68.85.

In London a comparable crude rose more than $2 to $67.40.

Natural gas on the New York Mercantile Exchange, meanwhile, climbed to $11.10 per million Btu, a nominal record for the commodity.

Gulf producers closed nearly all offshore oil and gas facilities just before Katrina blew in, depriving U.S. markets of about 25 percent of their total supply.

Besides oil and gas price hikes, refined products also rose. Gasoline hit $2.185 per gallon, and heating oil climbed to $1.985 per gallon.

Much of the product price increase stems from eight Gulf Coast refinery closures, which together account for 12 percent of the U.S. product supply.