Will Calgary see huge gas price jump that Eastern provinces just saw?
Posted Apr 18, 2024 3:12 pm.
Ontario, Quebec and Eastern Canada saw a huge jump in gas prices this week. Should that recent double digit spike concern Albertans?
Only if they are visiting out east, says one gas expert.
Patrick De Haan, the head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, says this week’s spike in the eastern part of the country was overwhelmingly due to the changeover from winter to summer gas.
“The difference here is that different areas across Canada make the transition to summer gasoline earlier, some later,” he says. “Calgary has already seen the rollover to summer gasoline happen.”
The eastern portion of the country just saw the switch to summer blends this week, which led to a double-digit overnight spike in most markets from Ontario to the east.
Despite that, the surge still led to Ontario Premier Doug Ford lashing out at gas companies, calling the overnight increase “unacceptable” and “disgusting.”
De Haan says only a very small part of the that surge was actually due to oil prices, considering refinery maintenance issues stateside and what’s happening in the Middle East.
He predicts Calgary drivers will see stabilized gas prices into the next month or two, and he thinks they may even go a little lower.
“We could be seeing some light at the end of the tunnel,” he says. “With oil prices having dropped $5 a barrel from their peak last, there is a potential that we may have just seen the peak happen in terms of gas prices for the next few months.”
He says the prices typically peak in April or May, once refineries are done with maintenance. After that they generally boost production through the summer.
Prices at the pumps surged 14 cents overnight to 178.9 cents/litre at most stations in the Greater Toronto Area. The average price in Calgary as of Thursday is 158.5 cents/litre, according to GasBuddy.
The federal carbon tax increased on Apr. 1 by 3.3 cents to 17.6 cents a litre, or 24 per cent. Alberta’s own provincial fuel tax also came into effect on the same day — pushing the cost per litre from nine cents to 13 cents.
