ESCONDIDO -- Average gasoline prices in North County jumped by 14 cents Wednesday to $2.81 per gallon over one week ago, the biggest weekly increase since April, according to a regional survey conducted for the North County Times.
That price was also sharply higher than one year ago when the average price for a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline was $2.47, or 34 cents lower, the survey by Utility Consumers' Action Network found.
A spokesman for the oil industry and a state energy official blamed the spike on a combination of factors: higher oil prices, two major refinery fires, and the disruption from refiners converting from one state-mandated blend of gasoline to another.
Charles Langley, spokesman for the consumer advocate group, challenged those reasons. He said prices have risen because six major oil companies control 91 percent of California refining and charge what they can get.
Langley pointed out that circumstances, except for the fires, are the same as one year ago, yet gas was 30 cents per gallon less then.
"From what we can tell, we are getting gouged," he said.
The average price in North County on Wednesday was 11 cents lower than in San Francisco and 5 cents higher than in Los Angeles, the highest and third highest prices in the nation. North County's $2.81 price is 1 cent higher than California's average price and 43 cents higher than the roughly $2.38 national average, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. Nationwide, the average price of gas increased almost 9 cents from one week ago.
North County's highest gasoline price occurred on May 14, 2006, when average prices reached $3.41 per gallon.
The price of light, sweet crude oil, commonly used to make gasoline, is one factor in the gasoline price spike, with the cost increasing in the past week by $1.72 to close at $61.79 per barrel. An oil industry official said gasoline prices typically rise almost 3 cents for every $1 rise in crude oil prices.
Refinery fires at a Chevron facility in Northern California and at a Valero refinery in Texas caused partial production shut downs and limited supply, according government energy experts.
The Chevron fire caused gasoline to be shipped from Southern California to Northern California, making the remaining gasoline in Southern California more expensive. The Valero fire disrupted supply to Arizona, causing Southern California refineries to send some of their gasoline to Arizona, again reducing the supply in Southern California.
Joe Sparano, president of the Western States Petroleum Association and spokesman for the oil industry, said the fires and crude-oil price increases prove that California's gasoline price spikes are the work of market forces.
"In the end, it's just supply and demand," he said.
Another factor in the sharp increase is the disruption of the twice-yearly seasonal switchover from one blend of gas to another blend, according to Susanne Garfield, spokeswoman for the California Energy Commission. That means that starting today, gas stations must sell summer blend, specially formulated to reduce smog. If they had winter blend in their holding tanks, station owners had to ship those back to the refineries.
Historically, oil prices are lower than when they came close to $98 per barrel in December, 1979, in today's money after adjusting for inflation.
- Contact staff writer Patrick Wright at (760) 739-6675 or pwright@nctimes.com.
