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Retail gasoline price hits record $2.37/gallon

Posted on: Monday, 8 August 2005, 16:23 CDT

By Tom Doggett

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The average U.S. retail gasoline price rose 7.7 cents over the last week to a record high of $2.37 a gallon, the government said on Monday, as motorists dig deeper into their wallets for the final weeks of the summer vacation season.

The national price for regular unleaded gasoline is up 49 cents from a year ago, surpassing the old record of $2.33 set on July 11, according to a survey of service stations conducted by the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

Rising pump costs reflect record prices for crude oil, which climbed to a record $64 a barrel on Monday at the New York Mercantile Exchange.

The price for crude oil accounts for about half the cost of making gasoline.

When adjusted for inflation, the highest price for gasoline would be around $3.12 a gallon in March 1981, the EIA said.

The new record gasoline and crude oil prices came on the day President Bush signed into law legislation to update U.S. energy policy and boost domestic energy supplies in the years ahead.

Bush conceded the law will not lower energy prices soon.

"We're not going to solve our energy challenges overnight," Bush said. "Most of the serious problems, such as high gasoline costs and rising dependence on foreign oil, have developed over decades. It's going to take years of focused effort to alleviate those problems."

A separate survey from the AAA auto group showed U.S. gasoline prices struck a new peak Monday at $2.34 a gallon.

California gas prices are the highest in the continental United States at $2.64 a gallon, according to the AAA survey of 60,000 retail gas stations.

In the weekly EIA survey, the West Coast had the most expensive regular unleaded gasoline, with the price up 5.6 cents at $2.57 a gallon. San Francisco topped the agency's survey of cities, with the price of gasoline also up 5.6 cents at $2.64.

The Gulf Coast states, where many refineries are located, had the cheapest fuel, with the price up 10 cents at $2.28 per gallon. Among major cities, Houston had the best deal at the pump, with fuel up 10.3 cents at $2.26.

The EIA report also showed prices, rounded to the nearest penny, up 6 cents at $2.54 in Seattle, up 10.5 cents at $2.46 in Chicago, up 5.8 cents at $2.42 in Miami, up 1.8 cents at $2.42 in New York City, up 2.5 cents at $2.39 in Boston, and up 14.4 cents at $2.34 in Cleveland.

Separately, the average price for diesel fuel increased 5.9 cents $2.41 a gallon, up 59 cents from a year earlier and less than half a penny from a new record high, the EIA said.

Truckers on the West Coast paid the most for diesel at $2.80 a gallon, up 21 cents from last week. In California alone, diesel jumped 29 cents in one week to $2.94 after a major Chevron refinery in the state was shut down.

The Gulf Coast states had the cheapest diesel at $2.32 a gallon, up 4.4 cents.

Source: REUTERS

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