“Heat has been a sudden jolt the past two weeks, but brewing behind the scenes has been the price of oil, which for five straight weeks has been rising,” Patrick DeHaan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy told the Post. “The Russians and Saudis have been colluding to limit production into the market at a time that it’s looking like the economy may not get dragged to the depths of a recession.”
News
Heat Wave Driving Gas Prices Up, AAA Says

The recent heat wave has driven gas prices up, but that price will likely fall soon, according to AAA.
“Last month’s extreme heat played a role in the recent spike in gas prices due to some refineries pulling back, but now operations are getting back to normal,” AAA spokesperson Andrew Gross said in a statement. “Coupled with tepid demand and declining oil prices, this may help take the steam out of the tight supply price jolts we’ve seen lately.”
July 2023 was the hottest month on record, Reuters reported. U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres used the phrase “global boiling” to describe the worldwide heatwave. The mean temperature worldwide is approximately 0.4 degrees warmer than the previous record set in July 2019, and 2.7 degrees above the pre-industrial mean, according to Reuters.
The heat has caused refineries to slow production, as they tend to shut down in temperatures higher than 95 degrees, according to the Washington Post. The extra heat can make refineries more dangerous.
“Refineries break down in extreme heat. It’s like running an engine at very hot temperatures for a long time,” said Tom Kloza, president of the Oil Price Information Service, told CNN.
Lowering temperatures have allowed refineries to commence regular operations, and will likely lower prices again. However, other extreme weather conditions threaten to drive prices up. For example, hurricanes could cause more spikes, according to the Washington Post.
“If a hurricane hits that hot Gulf Coast water, that could boost prices on the national level 10 to 30 cents, even if only for a month,” Gross told the paper.
The extreme heat is not the only reason for high prices, though. Saudi Arabia recently announced Thursday that until September, oil production would be cut by 1 million barrels a day, according to UPI.
Featured image by Rafael Castillo via Wikimedia Commons
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