Diesel Prices Jump 8.2¢ to $4.104 a Gallon
This story appears in the Feb. 18 print edition of Transport Topics.
Retail fuel prices spiked again last week, with diesel rising 8.2 cents to $4.104 a gallon, the Department of Energy reported.
Meanwhile, the average price of a gallon of regular gasoline rose 7.3 cents to $3.611, leaving both fuels at their highest level since Oct. 22, DOE’s Energy Information Administration said after its Feb. 11 survey of fueling stations.
Diesel’s increase followed a 9.5-cent jump the previous week. Over the past month, commercial trucking’s main fuel has now risen 21 cents, following a string of seven straight drops, which totaled only 14 cents, according to DOE data.
Gasoline, meanwhile, has in-creased each week since Dec. 17, gaining a combined 35.7 cents between that date and Feb. 11.
Diesel is 16.1 cents, or 4.1%, higher than a year earlier, and gas is 8.8 cents above the corres-ponding week in 2012, DOE reported.
The recent jumps at the pump are due to increases in the price of crude oil, which has gained more than $10 a barrel since early December, said Tom Kloza, chief oil analyst at the Oil Price Information Service in Wall, N.J.
Kloza also said he is somewhat surprised the retail increases have not been steeper.
“You’ve had higher crude prices, and you’ve had a little touch of winter here in the U.S., and maybe to a lesser extent overseas,” Kloza told Transport Topics. “When you look at diesel prices across the country, so far, we’ve dodged a little bit of a bullet.”
Low inventories of diesel also are contributing to high prices, Kloza said. Stocks of distillate fuels are lower than their year-ago figures and crude oil futures have stayed above $95 per barrel throughout February on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
William Logue, president of less-than-truckload carrier FedEx Freight, told TT that his main concern when fuel prices rise is the effect on the economy.
“Any time diesel fuel and gasoline prices go up, there’s a risk in the long term for the economy,” Logue said in a Feb. 12 interview at TT headquarters in Arlington, Va. Money spent on petroleum products lessens the amount available for purchasing the goods that become freight, he said.
While fuel surcharges remain the carrier’s primary coping mechanism for fuel price increases, Logue said that FedEx Freight also is investigating the usefulness of vehicles powered by natural gas. The carrier is testing two Kenworth Truck Co. tractors with prototype models of the Cummins Westport ISX 12G engines.
“We’re running them hard,” on routes in Texas, Logue said. “Early on, the drivers seem to love them, but mainly the data is coming in now and we’re analyzing it,” he said.
Logue said FedEx Freight also would consider using 15-liter liquefied natural-gas trucks on more demanding routes, but for now it is starting with 12-liter models.
FedEx Freight is a unit of FedEx Corp., which ranks No. 2 on the TT Top 100 listing of the largest for-hire carriers in the United States and Canada.
On Feb. 13, crude oil for March delivery hit $98.11 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, the highest price since Feb. 1.
Oil rose after a report showing that fuel consumption gained 5.5% to 19 million barrels a day in the most recent week, the most since the week ended Dec. 14. Crude was trading around $85 a barrel in mid-December.
Although EIA said in its latest Short-Term Energy Outlook that diesel prices should be lower this year than in 2012, it also raised its projection for 2013 and noted it likely will be several months before prices fall back below $4 a gallon.
EIA said Feb. 12 diesel will average $3.92 a gallon over the course of 2013, which is below the $3.97 it averaged in 2012, but 5 cents above its prediction last month.
EIA said diesel will peak at an average of $4.07 during March and not fall below $4 until June. However, EIA projected stable prices between $3.80 and $3.86 during the second half of the year.
Associate News Editor Jonathan S. Reiskin contributed to this story.
