Image by Flickr user bikini sleepshirt
Update March 11: If you've filled up your tank recently, you'll have noticed that just as the conflict around Libya's oil fields has yet to cool, so has the price of crude and at the pump.
Since our last update the price for a gallon of gas in Charleston has ratcheted up 18¢ a gallon to some $3.41, and I've seen prices at nearly $3.50.
Makes you long for those high prices we posted on back in late February. Sell that gold and buy oil.
With the recent quake/tsunami in Japan and continuing conflict in Libya, it's getting really hard to read the energy price tea leaves, but hopefully it cools soon.
If you're a little hazy on how the price at the pump gets set, remember the guy that owns the station isn't getting rich — here's some insight from The San Francisco Chronicle.
Reminder: There's plenty of things you can do to save on gas, and here's a map of Charleston-area gas prices.
Update March 1: Following the leveling — but still high prices — of crude oil, local gas prices have ticked up since last week.
Beaufort prices now sit up 4¢ a gallon and $3.23 a gallon, moving up just 2¢ in the last four days. Is that the end of the crescendo before the fall? Time will tell, but it looks like you'll be stuck paying more for a while yet.
First reporting: As turmoil in the Mideast continues to raise speculation fears and run up the price of crude, so does the price at the pump go up.
And everyone's noticing, including your neighbor two doors down with the hybrid that's been pointing and laughing all day and night.
The national average for a gallon of gas has hit $3.31 and in South Carolina it's rocketed some 20¢ a gallon in just the last week to $3.19 a gallon. Ouch.
So what to do? Well hopefully calm will return to the markets and prices will dip back down (they're the highest they've been since the 2008 gas price crash) and there's plenty of things you can do to save on gas. And here's a map of Charleston-area gas prices, there're still a few holdouts charging just $3.03 a gallon.
Side note: Remember how everyone freaked out in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina that gas hit $3 a gallon? Sadly funny now.
Gas prices are at a multi-year high.
