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Melville, N.Y.-Area Gas Prices Jump 6 Cents a Gallon

Posted on: Tuesday, 20 December 2005, 21:00 CST

By Tom Incantalupo, Newsday, Melville, N.Y.

Dec. 21--Gasoline prices on Long Island jumped by almost 6 cents a gallon on average in the past week, in what analysts said was a delayed reaction to an increase in crude oil prices and a result of higher demand because of holiday-related driving.

The American Automobile Association said regular unleaded gasoline averaged $2.417 a gallon in Nassau and Suffolk counties yesterday, up 5.7 cents from a week earlier and 38.5 cents higher than a year earlier.

Mark Routt, an analyst with the consulting firm Energy Security Analysis Inc. in Wakefield, Mass., said retail prices are catching up to a jump in crude oil from less than $56 a barrel in mid-November to more than $62 in mid-December.

"The good news," he said, "is that in the last five or six days, the price of crude has come down."

So, he said, retail gasoline prices should follow, probably next month. Plus, Routt said, once the holiday season ends, driving and gasoline demand usually decreases. "As demand starts to ease in the next few weeks, prices should go down with it," he said.

Home heating oil, meanwhile, rose by a half-cent on average in Nassau and Suffolk counties over the past week, to an average Monday of $2.671 a gallon, the state Energy Research and Development Authority said yesterday.

Crude oil for January delivery rose 64 cents yesterday to close $57.98 a barrel in trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Oil has fallen 18 percent from an August record of $70.85, and touched a three-week low of $56.90 Monday.

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Source: Newsday, Melville, N.Y.

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