It seems like every time a motorist passes a filling station they look at the price board with fear in their eyes.
Don Good, of the Good Oil Company in Winamac, explains the dramatic increase this week.
“We saw the prices starting to slide on a nationwide basis here a while back just like we thought they would. They peaked during the RFG changeover where the oil companies have to pull down the tanks. Every year it comes up when they switch from summer to winter grade. What happened unfortunately here in the Midwest was about the time saw it starting to drop from the world markets and the crude dropping and so forth, they had a refinery problem at the Exxon Mobil plant. They had a fire there and as they were trying to straighten it out, they had an electrical problem at the Robinson Marathon refinery. So, all of a sudden in the Midwest, we had two refineries go down within about a week apart and that gives the speculators reason to jump in. While the prices dropped around the nation and it continued to slide here in the Midwest, we’re seeing the impact of those refinery problems and that’s what’s driving the market back up,” explained Don Good.
We asked Don Good if he expects prices to decrease soon.
“From what we’re hearing, within 10 days to two weeks, we could possibly see the prices retreat again. We still have a lot of product in storage. I think we’ll be in that $3.75 range. Hopefully we’ll get into the $3.40-$3.70 range. If everything goes well, that’s probably where it’ll settle at. It probably won’t go much lower than that.”
