Gas on LI could be $4 a gallon by summer

Gasoline prices crept up by another fraction of a cent on Long Island in the past week -- at a time of year when they usually are falling -- and some analysts think prices could reach $4 a gallon during the summer driving season.

Regular gas averaged $3.345 a gallon in Nassau and Suffolk counties Wednesday, the AAA said, based on a survey done for it of credit card transactions at 100,000 stations nationally -- up by nine cents from a month earlier and 46 cents from a year earlier. Gasoline prices have been rising locally since their recent low of $2.829 a gallon on Sept. 7. The record high Long Island average for regular in the AAA survey was $4.346 a gallon in July 2008.

Home heating oil also continues to rise - it was up 1.4 cents in the week ended Monday, to $3.511 a gallon, according to a survey by the state Energy Research and Development Authority. That's the highest since October 2008. The average price for the fuel that most Long Islanders use to heat their homes has risen by 53.2 cents a gallon since mid-August.

Prices for crude oil, gasoline's main ingredient, are about 10 percent higher than a year ago, at about $90 a barrel, as growing world economies require more energy and a weak dollar has drawn investors.

Carl Larry, president of the research and consulting firm Oil Outlooks & Opinions Llc in Houston, says crude oil could reach a record $150 a barrel later this year, well past the point at which gasoline prices would top $4 a gallon. "I think it would be in middle to late summer when you see those prices," he said, unless the national employment picture remains as weak as it is right now and a rise in prices chokes off demand.

However, analyst Stephen Schork, president of the Schork Group Inc. in Villanova, Pa., said in an interview with Bloomberg TV that crude oil prices are likely to rise to $100 a barrel in 2011, but he believes the retail gasoline price probably will fall short of $4 a gallon.