By Terry Miller
By last Friday morning, prices at the pump were already on the rise at hundreds of service stations around Southern California.
A decline of more than one million barrels in gasoline inventory on the West Coast was just one of the alleged reasons for the surge in prices, according to gasbuddy.com.
Also, fuel imports into the region have dropped to zero for the first time since March, according to the website, which cited a report from the Energy Information Administration.
The average price of a gallon on gas nationally however is still cheaper than it was at this time last year, according to AAA.
Friday’s average gas prices per gallon around the region.
-Los Angeles-Long Beach $3.656
-Orange County $3.625
-Riverside-San Bernardino $3.558
On Monday morning, however, gas stations in Pasadena were demanding upwards of $5 a gallon: a jump of over one dollar from Friday’s price.
While gas prices nationwide are apparently on a downward trend, California is experiencing a spike that could see prices top $5 a gallon before easing again, according to analysts.
A shortage in oil and other components used in refining California’s unique blend of less-polluting gas was one of the reasons for the price jump, industry analyst Trilby Lundberg said Sunday.
A slowdown in imported crude and a refinery shut-down in Torrance also caused wholesale prices to skyrocket, experts said.
The highest average price in the nation was $3.66 a gallon in Los Angeles as of Friday – a jump of 9 cents, according to Lundberg’s bi-weekly survey. But prices rose another 13 cents in a special survey conducted Saturday, she said.
Patrick DeHaan, a senior petroleum analyst at Gas Buddy, told the Los Angeles Times that California had become unattractive to foreign suppliers because prices had been dropping for months.
Nationwide, the average price of gasoline dropped 2 cents over the past two weeks to $2.83 a gallon. The average national price for midgrade gas was $3.05, with premium going for $3.22, according to the Lundberg survey.
