Are NJ gas prices affected by this heat wave?
New Jersey escaped the worst of Hurricane Beryl with the exception of a few showers later this week. But a heat wave continues to scorch the state and much of the nation. And the worst of hurricane season is yet to come.
All of that translates to potentially surging gas prices this summer, analysts warn.
Gas is currently $3.50 a gallon, according to the travel club AAA, a far cry from the record-high $5.05 a gallon seen in June 2022.
But hurricanes are essentially a wild card for summer gas prices, with the potential to push them up by another 25 to 50 cents in a manner of days, said Patrick De Haan, a petroleum analyst at GasBuddy.com.
An outage of roughly 1.5 million barrels could push prices by an extra 25 to 30 cents, according to Reuters.
The National Weather Service is predicting a more intense hurricane season in the Atlantic Ocean between June and November, thanks to warmer Atlantic Ocean temperatures and La Nina conditions in the Pacific Ocean.
“As we approach August and the peak of hurricane season, there remains a risk that the national average could surge temporarily if we see a major storm in the wrong place,” De Haan said in a recent blog post.
If a major storm were to hit the Gulf Coast — especially Texas and Louisiana, where dozens of refineries are situated — the nation could take a hit of up to a million barrels of fuel supply a day, according to the U.S Energy Information Administration.
The EIA estimated that the Gulf of Mexico accounts for 14% of U.S crude oil output.
Hurricane Ida in 2021 disrupted oil production enough that U.S oil and gas companies fell behind by over 1.7 million barrels of oil a day.
Texas has been hounded by the double whammy of Beryl and a prolonged heat wave pushing temperatures above 100 degrees.
Refineries in the middle of the country and the north “were not engineered for 100-degree heat waves,” said Mark Schieldrop, a spokesperson for AAA Northeast. “A couple of days of extreme heat won’t make much of a difference, but prolonged periods of extreme heat is increasingly a concern.”
Refineries are typically designed to operate at between 32 and 95 degrees Fahrenheit — anything above that, such as the triple-digit temperatures Texas is undergoing, could lead to equipment malfunctions.
Refineries employ a delicate process to manufacture oil, which excessive heat could easily disrupt, said AAA spokesperson Schieldrop.
On the plus side, hotter weather could lower demand for gasoline, Schieldrop said, “which can help offset some of the acute impact of the weather.”
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