Don't expect gas price break
Drivers shouldn't get excited by the news of another week of increased oil inventories or the Congressional action to stop filling the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (though that was clearly a small, helpful move). The Congressional action will potentially mean about 70,000 barrels a day of extra oil on the market, less than the typical week-to-week fluctuation in imports. The increase in oil inventories this week was smaller than the last two, which made no difference in oil prices, and was almost entirely driven by increases in propane and distillate fuels (mostly diesel fuel in this season). Gasoline inventories actually dropped by 1.7 million barrels and crude oil inventories only rose by 200,000 barrels.
Here's an interesting point of reference for what the 200,000 barrel rise means - refinery inputs rose by 405,000 barrels of crude oil per day to a daily level of 15.1 million barrels and refineries were still operating at only 86.6% of capacity. The increase in distillate fuels is good news for truck drivers and should push diesel prices back toward parity with gas prices, especially if gas prices rise further. Gas futures have risen since the report was released and stand at $3.185/gallon.
US Petroleum Supplies and Refining At a Glance
- Total Petroleum Inventories: Up 5.0 million barrels
- Crude Oil Inventories: Up 200,000 barrels
- Gasoline Inventories: Down 1.7 million barrels
- Distillate Fuels Inventories: Up 1.4 million barrels
- Propane/propylene inventories: Up 1.5 million barrels
- Refinery Crude Inputs: 15.1 million barrels/day
- Change: up 405,000 barrels/day
- Refinery Activity: 86.6%
US Petroleum Demand At a Glance
Compared to Same 4-Week Period Last Year
- Total Products Supplied: Down 0.3%
- Gasoline: Down 0.2%
- Distillate Fuel: Up 0.8%
- Jet Fuel: Down 5.3%
This Week in Petroleum took a look at the decline in heating oil use with the headline «Going the Way of the Typewriter? » Outside the Northeast, heating oil use has dwindled to nearly zero and even in the Northeast, heating oil accounts for well under half of home heating.


















