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Gas prices climbing

Slight increase in Durango looks likely to continue
Gas prices are slowly rising in Durango and across the state and nation. Prices are expected to continue to rise over the next few weeks before dropping again.

Durango gasoline prices continue to slowly climb, and analysts expect the increase to continue over the next few weeks.

Regular gas crawled up 3 cents Thursday over Wednesday’s price, to $2.25, according to AAA’s Fuel Gauge Report.

A week ago, gas was at $2.21 in Durango. Only a month ago, gas was slightly more than $2.09 in town.

Prices, however, remain significantly lower than a year ago, thanks to a drop in the value of crude oil. West Texas Intermediate crude was trading at about $48 per barrel Thursday afternoon. A year ago, oil was trading closer to $100 per barrel.

Analysts predict gas prices will continue to climb over the next few weeks before likely dipping again. Experts point out that crude oil is not the only deciding factor guiding the price of gas.

Patrick DeHaan, senior petroleum analyst for Chicago-based GasBuddy.com, said the reason prices are spiking is because refineries scale back production in the fall and late winter for maintenance reasons.

He said when the maintenance occurs, gas prices tend to detach from crude oil prices, instead relying on factors that come from a lack of refineries operating heavy workloads.

“If nobody is there to do the work to refine that barrel of oil into gasoline, it doesn’t matter how cheap that oil is,” DeHaan said.

Crude oil inventories spiked by 8 million barrels, while gasoline inventories dropped by about 3 million barrels.

“Crude oil is starting to pile up because refineries are processing less of it,” DeHaan said.

Nationally, gasoline is up about 6 cents per gallon.

Analysts are expecting prices to spike anywhere from 10 to 20 cents in Colorado and follow a similar trend nationally.

“It’s almost a guarantee that prices in Denver will make some sort of increase, as much as 10 to 20 cents per gallon over the next two to three weeks,” DeHaan said. “The $2 prices will disappear, and we will see prices continue to rally, probably through April or early May.”

pmarcus@durangoherald.com



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