Fuel

Infrastructure and trade loom large for trucking in the year ahead as freight carriers adjust to a slower, but still positive, rate of economic growth in 2019, according to industry experts interviewed by Transport Topics.

The projected $2.70 a gallon pump price for 2019 is 3 cents lower than 2018 levels, although this year’s high could reach $3 as soon as May and top $4 in some cities, according to GasBuddy’s Price Fuel Outlook. The lower prices have not escaped Trump’s attention, who equated them to a tax cut in a tweet Jan. 1.

The U.S. average retail price of diesel dropped 2.9 cents to $3.048 a gallon, the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported, as crude oil prices hovered around $45 per barrel.

Oil started 2019 with another price slide as weaker Chinese manufacturing data pointed to slowing demand in the world’s second-biggest consumer of the fuel and to growing risks of a global crude surplus.

The U.S. may be exporting natural gas at a record clip, but that hasn’t stopped it from accepting new imports. A tanker with fuel from Nigeria is sitting near the Cove Point import terminal in Maryland, while a second ship with Russian gas is idling outside Boston Harbor.

Job growth in the Lone Star State will likely weaken in the first half of 2019 if oil prices remain at current levels, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

BILLINGS, Mont. — President Donald Trump’s administration miscalculated the potential benefits of putting better brakes on trains that haul explosive fuels when it scrapped an Obama-era rule over cost concerns, The Associated Press has found. A government analysis used to justify the cancellation omitted up to $117 million in estimated future damages from train derailments that could be avoided by using electronic brakes.

The U.S. average retail price of diesel dropped 4.4 cents to $3.077 a gallon, the U.S. Energy Information Administration reported, as crude oil prices lingered below $50 per barrel.

The U.S. oil industry is delivering a one-two punch to Middle East producers already reeling from a collapse in prices. A tussle is playing out in the market for so-called light oils, which have a lower sulfur content and are less dense than heavier varieties.

Diesel prices started off 2018 low, but as the year comes to a close, the average price of diesel is more than 20 cents higher than in 2017.