Retail Heating Oil and Diesel Fuel Prices
Sources: History: EIA; Projections: Short-Term Energy Outlook, February 2001.
Notes:
- With the worst of the heating season (October-March) now behind us, we can be fairly confident that retail heating oil prices have seen their seasonal peak. Relatively mild weather and a softening of crude oil prices have helped ease heating oil prices. Spot heating oil prices recently reached their lowest levels in over six months.
- Because of relatively balmy weather in the Northeast in January and February, heating oil stock levels have stabilized. Furthermore, heating oil production has been unusually robust, running several hundred thousand barrels per day over last year's pace.
- Currently, EIA expects winter prices to average around $1.41, which is quite high in historical terms. The national average price in December 2000 was 44 cents per gallon above the December 1999 price. For February 2001, the average price is not expected to be much different from the record high of $1.42 per gallon set last February.