By The News Service of Florida
Gas prices eased in Florida over the past week, but areas of South Florida and the Big Bend remain over $4 a gallon while diesel continues to top $5 a gallon statewide.
AAA put the average gallon of gas in Florida at $3.86 on Monday, 3 cents higher than a week earlier.
Averages range from $3.58 a gallon in Escambia County at the western end of the Panhandle to $4.10 in Monroe County, which includes the Florida Keys.
The state average is up about 80 cents from a year ago, according to AAA.
Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at Gas Buddy, said Sunday there is a “rising risk of prices eventually climbing again” as Iran has called for concessions from the U.S. needed to open oil shipping through the Straits of Hormuz.
Beyond the Iran war, pump prices could benefit from students returning to school which reduces summer travel demand. But pulling the other way is the global shortage in refining capacity, which could slow any decline in prices motorists pay, according to GasBuddy.
Emergency drawdowns over the past several months on the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve have the reserve at a 43-year low, according to U.S. Energy Information Administration data.
Diesel, vital to trucking and farming in Florida, stood at $5.29 a gallon on Monday, down 5 cents on the week, but up 59 cents in the past month. A year ago, diesel in Florida averaged $3.62 a gallon.
For motorists with electric vehicles, the average kilowatt-hour cost at charging stations in Florida on Sunday rounded down to 41 cents, a rate mostly unchanged since early March.
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