LI gas prices slip could become slide
Arsenio Artiguez of Island Park gets gas for his vehicle at a Hess Station in Long Beach. Experts expect gas prices to slip below $3 a gallon, especially after Memorial Day. (April 2010) Credit: Danielle Finkelstein
Gasoline prices slipped just a bit on Long Island in the past week -- a silver lining for drivers on the cloud of U.S. and European economic problems that are depressing gasoline demand and crude oil prices.
Some experts think prices at the pumps might already have peaked for the spring-summer driving season and are headed lower. Phil Flynn, senior energy analyst for the broker PFG Best in Chicago, thinks prices will continue to slide, especially after the Memorial Day weekend, by 10 to 25 cents a gallon. "At your stations on Long Island," he said, "your average should get back below $3 a gallon.''
Regular averaged $3.133 a gallon in Nassau and Suffolk Wednesday, down a fraction of a cent from a week earlier, according to a survey of gasoline stations done for the AAA.
Flynn says crude prices are slipping because Europe's credit crisis has depressed the value of the euro against the dollar. Since crude oil is priced worldwide in dollars, a stronger dollar makes oil less attractive to investors. Crude futures fell by 72 cents Wednesday on the New York Mercantile Exchange to settle at $75.65. They had reached $87.15 a barrel on May 3, the highest level since October 2008, according to The Associated Press.
Further, gasoline supplies are ample, says Flynn. Though the nation's gasoline stocks fell last week from the week before, by 2.8 million barrels, they stood 13.8 million barrels higher than a year earlier, the U.S. Department of Energy said Wednesday.
And demand is relatively soft due to the recession. It fell last week from the week before, by 142,000 barrels a day, to 9.14 million, the energy department said in its weekly fuels update - though demand is higher than a year ago, by 230,000 barrels a day.
Flynn says, however, that unanticipated factors like political turmoil that interrupts petroleum supplies from Iran could send prices climbing again. So could a bad hurricane season or another economic crisis in the United States that forces the government to inject more money into the economy - which can weaken the dollar.
Wednesday, the website long islandgasprices.com, which compiles motorist reports, listed prices as high as $3.29 a gallon for regular - at nine stations in Nassau and Suffolk counties - and no lower than $2.93, at BJ's in Farmingdale, whose pumps are open only to club members.
Meanwhile, heating oil prices also have slipped. A survey done Monday by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority found a Long Island average price of $3.117 at full-service dealers, down 4 cents from the April 26 survey. The new average was 55.2 cents higher than a year earlier.
