LI gas prices sliding down, reports say

Gasoline prices are still slipping -- good news as the approaching Memorial Day weekend signals the start of the summer driving season -- with the average for regular down 9.7 cents on Long Island since last week to $4.145, the AAA said.

Normally, gasoline prices and consumption rise at this time of year, but this spring has been anything but normal.

Weak demand, an increase in U.S. refinery output and higher imports of gasoline from Europe suggest that prices will keep dropping at least through July, said Sander Cohan, who tracks gasoline for consultants Energy Security Analysis Inc. in Wakefield, Mass. They could fall by another 50 cents from current levels assuming crude oil stays around $100 a barrel.

"You might see surges here and there," Cohan said, "but the reality is the market is well supplied."

The website LongIslandgasprices.com, which is based on motorists' reports, Wednesday listed stations with regular gas priced as low as $3.89 a gallon.

"I'm glad to see it go down," said retiree Karl Bernstein, 76, of Woodmere. Active in the Boy Scouts and with a daughter living in Rockland County, he says he averages about 1,000 miles a week in his 2011 Hyundai Sonata and, since gasoline prices started rising, he has been shopping for price and trying to fill up at cheaper New Jersey stations when he visits his daughter.

MasterCard Advisors said Tuesday that American drivers continued conserving last week, even as prices began falling, buying about 2 percent less than a year earlier by all methods of payment. The decline was steeper, 3 percent, for the Mid-Atlantic region, the company said.

The U.S. Energy Department said gasoline supplies nationally rose last week from the week before by almost 2 percent to about 210 million barrels.

Carl Larry, director of energy derivatives and research at Blue Ocean Brokerage LLC in Manhattan, also expects a continued drop in prices except, perhaps, for a mild surge before the July 4 weekend. But he thinks demand is likely to begin increasing as prices ease. "As Americans, we love to drive," he said. "The weather is getting better."

The AAA has forecast that Americans would reduce their driving slightly compared with last year during the long holiday weekend that begins Friday evening. The Energy Department is forecasting that gasoline prices nationally will average about $3.80 a gallon this summer -- about the national average Wednesday for regular, $3.813. That figure is down 11.2 cents from a week earlier.

Gasoline prices locally had been rising almost daily since the recent low of $2.829 a gallon on Sept. 7. The average for regular in the AAA survey peaked May 12 at $4.284 a gallon -- 6.2 cents shy of the record average in that survey of $4.346 a gallon set in 2008.

The decline in gasoline prices trails the decline in crude oil prices since their peak April 29 at about $114 a barrel for the U.S. benchmark grade.

Home heating oil prices slipped also in the past two weeks on Long Island, by 2.9 cents to $4.041 a gallon, according to the state Energy Research and Development Authority. The average, for full service dealers, peaked for the recent heating season at $4.238 April 11.