High gas prices mean fewer, shorter summer trips

MOSES LAKE — High gasoline prices across the country mean that fewer people will be taking to the road for their summer vacations, according to a study published by GasBuddy, a website that tracks retail gasoline prices across North America.

“It’s the story of oil, it’s up $22 per barrel since last year,” said Dan McTeague, a senior petroleum analyst for GasBuddy based in Washington, D.C.

With the price of benchmark West Texas Intermediate crude nearing $72 per barrel and nationwide gasoline prices nearing $3 per gallon, a GasBuddy report released Wednesday says that 25 percent fewer people plan on taking long road trips this summer when compared with last year.

However, the same survey reported that 17 percent more people said they would take more weekend trips when compared with last year.

“Sixty cents per gallon extra can equal $30 to $40 on a long trip,” McTeague said.

McTeague said the price of commodity gasoline in Washington state — gasoline sold by refiners and shippers to distributors — is running around $2.41 per gallon. It had been the most expensive gasoline in the county, but Chicago now has the most expensive refined gasoline in the country.

With the state’s high gasoline taxes — 67.8 cents per gallon when combined with federal gasoline taxes — it means prices in the state are already well past the $3 per gallon mark.

According to the GasBuddy app, gasoline in the Moses Lake area ranges from $3.19 per gallon at the Conoco on Airway Drive to $3.39 per gallon at the Union 76 in Ephrata. However, both those prices beat the reported Central Washington average of $3.42 per gallon, according to GasBuddy.

McTeague said gasoline in Washington has been more expensive than the national average in the last few months because two West Side refineries have been down for maintenance and repair, and demand in British Columbia — which cannot refine enough gasoline for its own use — is high.

“They’ve been importing gasoline into Washington and Oregon in the last few weeks,” McTeague said. “The state has even attracted gasoline shipments from Asia. There’s a pretty open and robust market in the Pacific.”

If you’re feeling some pain over the rise is gasoline prices, perhaps some sympathy for our Canadian neighbors is due. Despite having one of the largest reserves of crude oil in the world, thanks to the Athabasca Tar Sands, McTeague said gasoline prices in Vancouver are averaging roughly $4.75 per gallon, largely because of a dispute over a pipeline from Edmonton to the coast of British Columbia.

“It continues to be a bit of a problem,” he said.

Charles H. Featherstone can be reached via email at countygvt@columbiabasinherald.com.