Retail Fuel Prices Hit Fourth Straight Record Highs

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etail fuel prices hit record highs for a fourth straight week Monday, with diesel rising 1.3 cents to $2.316 and gasoline jumping 6.3 cents to $2.28 a gallon, the Department of Energy reported.

Diesel’s average price surged past a previous $2.212 all-time high set last October when it rose 5 cents to reach $2.244 on March 21. In the two weeks since then it rose by a half-cent and 5.4 cents a gallon before Monday's report.

In the past four weeks gasoline has risen by 5.3 cents, 4.4 cents and 6.4 cents, before Monday's reported increase. Gasoline’s previous record high had been $2.064 a gallon, set last May 24.

Analyst Trilby Lundberg had a similar figure to DOE’s in her latest Lundberg Survey gasoline report issued Sunday, putting the national average at $2.29 a gallon, although, she said, prices could be peaking.

The motor fuel surges have paralleled all-time high crude oil prices, which peaked early last week at a record $58.28 a barrel.

Oil futures have receded in the past week, and fell to a six-week low of $52.10 in intraday trading Monday on the New York Mercantile Exchange before rising to close at $53.71, Bloomberg reported.

Diesel was 63.7 cents higher than a year ago, DOE's figures showed. That translates to about $127.40 more this year over last year to fill a big rig’s 200-gallon tanks.

hile the increases for trucking’s main fuel moderated in most areas of the country compared with previous weeks, it still rose by 4.4 cents a gallon in both the West Coast region and the state of California.

The West Coast region’s average price hit $2.585 and California’s surged to $2.625 a gallon, the country’s highest.

he Gulf Coast had the smallest rise, a 1.1-cent uptick to $2.251, the lowest regional average, DOE said.

Every week DOE surveys 350 diesel-filling stations to compile a national snapshot price.