By Michael G. Malloy, Staff Reporter This story appears in the Sept. 1 print edition of Transport Topics.
The retail diesel price in the United States fell 1.4 cents to $3.821 a gallon, the lowest level during the final week of August in three years, the Department of Energy reported.
Overall, diesel has declined eight straight weeks. The current figure is also the lowest since July 1, 2013, and 9.2 cents less than the corresponding week last year, DOE said after its Aug. 25 survey of filling stations.
Diesel has dropped almost a dime in the past two months. The price has declined in 20 of the prior 24 weeks since mid-March when it was $4.021, which was the highest level in almost a year.
DOE also reported that retail gasoline average fell for the eighth consecutive week, slipping 1.8 cents to $3.454 a gallon. It has fallen 25 cents during that period and is almost a dime under its year-ago level.
The price slides came as crude oil fell to a seven-month low, closing at $93.35 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange on Aug. 25.
One analyst said last week that the lower crude prices are likely to hold diesel costs down for truckers.
“We should soon see nationwide diesel prices slip below $3.80 a gallon . . . [and] most fleets can find diesel available for the cheapest price we’ve seen at this time of year” in several years, said Tom Kloza, chef analyst at the Oil Price Information Service in Wall, New Jersey.
“While the average price is [about] $3.80, it’s not too difficult to beat that if one shops around,” Kloza said. “I suspect that fleets on cost-plus pricing are finding some of the cheapest levels they’ve seen in the last 40 months or more.”
An executive with Mesilla Valley Transportation said the company gives a new car each quarter to its company driver with the best mileage and gives a $25,000 cash bonus annually to the best performer. It’s part of a significant multipart plan to tackle fuel costs and raise the fleet average to 8.86 mpg.
“If it’s doable, we do it — everything from free-rolling tires, drivetrain changes, aerodynamics on trucks and trailers, routing, speed limiters and auxiliary power units,” CEO Royal Jones said told Transport Topics last week.
“We get a report every morning that shows the idle time to the fleet manager,” Jones said, adding that his company drivers’ idling time last week was 6.8%, which he said is below the industry’s average.
MVT has had APUs in all of its trucks since 2007 and has more recently begun rolling in Idle Free Systems’ battery-powered units into its operations.
The Las Cruces, New Mexico-based truckload carrier ranks No. 68 on the Transport Topics Top 100 list of U.S. and Canadian for-hire carriers.
DOE also reported last week that distillate inventories, which include diesel, rose 1.3 million barrels for the week ended Aug. 22.
Oil supplies declined 2.1 million barrels, and gasoline fell 1 million barrels.
OPIS’ Kloza said most of the recent retail fuel price declines are due to lower oil prices, which are down about $10 since Memorial Day.
He also said that while there is some planned maintenance in early autumn at U.S. refineries, he did not expect that to cause diesel prices to rise.
