From a gratified, Gaia worshiping AP:
"On Monday, retail gas prices rose for the fifth straight day, adding less than a penny overnight to a new national average of $2.648 a gallon, according to AAA, Wright Express and Oil Price Information Service.
A gallon of regular unleaded is still cheaper than it was a month ago. It's also 73.1 cents more expensive than the same time last year.
Rozell said motorists shouldn't expect a return of the price spikes of 2008, when gasoline jumped above $4 a gallon in some parts of the country. Americans simply aren't burning enough fuel to push prices that high.
"I'll be surprised if it got over $3.25," he said.
Gasoline futures also jumped Monday to the highest price in more than a month as investors looked ahead to the summer driving season. Prices also were propped up by a festering refinery strike in France, where workers angry about the uncertain future of a Total SA plant have shut down over half of the country's refining capacity.
The standoff already has led to gasoline shortages in parts of the country, and it appears to be spreading. Refinery workers at Exxon Mobil Corp.-owned Esso France are expected to join the walk out Tuesday, and workers at British-owned chemical company INEOS also plan to strike.
The dispute could affect U.S. supplies as well, since America imports gasoline from Europe. Jim Ritterbusch, president of energy consultancy Ritterbusch and Associates, said it's unlikely that U.S. gas stations would experience any shortages, but the country's surplus may dip in coming weeks."
All the more reason to start domestic drilling and building domestic refineries. Seems to me that would cut our dependence on foreign oil.
