The extremely high price of gasoline per gallon can be from a lot of different reasons here are just a few. Well you would think that just because less people are driving. That the cheaper gasoline would be with 7.6 million people losing jobs forcing them to be off the roadways but, on the contrary gas prices are still rising and rising. The national average of prices per gallon of gasoline is $3.073 which is more than a 40 cent increase from just 1 year ago. One of the big reasons of the gas prices is because of OPEC (the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries). They have regular meetings to determine what they will sell crude oil for. They are able to do a thing like that because they hold 79% of the worlds crude oil reserve and 44% of the worlds crude oil production. Right now the price of 1 barrel of oil is $89.32. Every 1$ increase in a barrel of gas is 2.5 more cents per gallon that we pay at the pump. 71% of what we pay at the pump comes from crude oil. The remaining 29% is found in taxes, distribution, marketing, and refining costs. So an increase of any of those means an increase in what we pay. The inventory of barrels of crude oil decreased by 1.3 million barrels, gasoline dropped by 2.3 million barrels, and all over petroleum inventory went down by a large total of 9.1 billion barrels in the week of December 24 2010. That could be a major reason for the raise in the price of gasoline per gallon in the us or worldwide. Former Shell oil president John Hofmeister told Platt Energy Week Television that the Gasoline prices could possibly hit around $5 dollars per gallon of gasoline by sometime in 2012. That would be devastating causing many more hard working people off of the roadways just because they simply cant afford it anymore. I mean $5 dollars per gallon of gasoline is outrageous if you have an 18 gallon gas tank like I do it would cost you 90 dollars every time you filled up. Now how long do you really think that you would be driving with gas prices like that the average American would most likely choose not to unless they didn’t have the option. With the raising gas prices there’s no way of knowing what will be going on in the next year or even five years. There is obviously going to be continued research on gasoline alternatives such as wind, solar, and others. For example there is a electric delivery vehicle completely powered by a battery it tops out at 55 mph and goes 100 miles on a single charge it is called the Smith Newton. In conclusion there are many different factors that can increase the price of gasoline per gallon but, you can defiantly count on it continuing to rise weather the economy or the amount of drivers are on the roadways.Resources:
http://fuelgaugereport.aaa.com/?redirectto=http://fuelgaugereport.opisnet.com/index.asp ,
http://www.oil-price.net/ , http://www.dailyfinance.com/story/no-relief-for-motorists-gas-prices-high-and-likely-going-higher/19313431/ ,http://www.rhinelanderdailynews.com/articles/2011/01/04/news/doc4d2333ab8e918587118738.txt ,http://www.thegreencarwebsite.co.uk/blog/index.php/2011/01/05/electric-truck-firm-buys-smith-electric-vehicles/
