Las Vegas Sun

March 29, 2024

Gasoline anxiety creeping eastward

One website that tracks the lowest gas prices is www.gasbuddy.com.

Tune-ups, new air filters and fully inflated tires can boost gas mileage.

Speeding, hard acceleration and braking waste gas. Each mile per hour you drive over 60 mph is like paying an extra 10 cents per gallon.

Use cruise control to maintain a steady speed. Use your vehicle's overdrive gear when appropriate to reduce engine speed.

Try walking, taking public transportation or carpooling whenever possible. Longer term, consumers can start looking at higher mileage cars or even gas-electric hybrids that can get more than 50 miles per gallon.

AAA also recommends that employers let their employees occasionally work from home to save commuting time and gasoline.

There is no argument that Nevadans have done their share -- more than their share some would say -- to help break AAA's national survey record for the highest average price for a gallon of unleaded regular gasoline.

On Tuesday the old national record of $1.737 per gallon, set Aug. 30 of last year, fell when an average $1.738 -- rounded off to $1.74 -- was recorded in the AAA survey of gas prices.

But don't blame the three states with the highest average gasoline prices -- California, Hawaii and Nevada -- for pushing the average to a new high, which last Thursday was 1.5 cents away from being broken.

Skyrocketing prices have been working their way toward the East Coast. Tuesday's AAA study found Illinois prices up 5 cents a gallon for regular unleaded and Ohio up 4 cents in just five days.

"They (Eastern states) are starting to feel our pain," said Sean Comey, Nevada spokesman for AAA, formerly the American Automobile Association. "We are very likely to see the prices remain high and get even higher as we move into the busy spring and summer travel seasons."

Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., and other Democrats have called on the Energy Department to release oil from the Strategic Oil Reserve to companies, to be repaid when the prices fall.

"We certainly are seeing higher prices spread across the country," said Tessa Hafen, Reid's spokeswoman.

The Senate has voted and members of the House have called on the Bush administration to at least stop filling the reserve, which would divert about a million barrels a week to refineries and consumers. That oil is now flowing to underground storage pools on the Gulf Coast.

However, Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham told a Senate hearing on Tuesday that the administration would continue to fill the reserve as a matter of national security. He said the price effect of stopping the flow into the reserve would be "fairly negligible" in a global oil market of more than 80 million barrels a day.

Hafen said in response to Reid's and other lawmakers' urging, the Federal Trade Commission has agreed to investigate prices in California. It's a start, Hafen said.

"When Senator Reid was in Nevada (last week), everywhere he went, whether to a school or to a town hall meeting, everyone wanted to talk about gasoline prices," she said.

"This is truly a pocketbook issue, especially to those on the West Coast who depend on their cars and to tourism in Nevada as summer approaches."

For more than a week prices in California, Hawaii and Nevada have remained stable at above $2 a gallon for regular -- $2.14 in California, $2.11 in Hawaii and $2.06 in Nevada, with average prices in Las Vegas at $2.10.

At an Arco station at Lake Mead and Rainbow boulevards Tuesday, Neil Davio said Las Vegas gas prices were hurting his wallet. Regular unleaded was going for $2.05 at the gas station.

"I didn't notice it too bad when they started rising, but now that they've stayed like this for some time, it's noticeable and I am realizing how much I'm spending at the gas station each week," said Davio, 44, who lives in northwest Las Vegas and drives a Hyundai Elantra.

Henderson resident Cheril Goldman agreed.

"If someone in Washington has the power to do something, they should do it," said Goldman, 51, filling her Nissan Maxima at a Texaco at Pecos Road and Windmill Parkway, where regular cost $2.04. "These prices are killing me. When it costs more than $20 to fill my tank, there's a problem."

Comey said with worldwide trends changing, conditions at the pumps are expected to get worse as crude oil is selling for greater than $38 a barrel and is getting more difficult to obtain.

"You have situations where the demand for light sweet crude oil (the type from which gasoline is produced) is rising in China and other Asian countries that are outbidding American refineries for contracts," Comey said. "So more crude oil is going to refineries overseas.

Earlier this month the Energy Information Administration, which is part of the federal Department of Energy, warned that gasoline prices might rise to a nationwide average of $1.83 per gallon in April.

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