Americans preparing for winter may soon feel a shock similar to what drivers felt at the pump this summer. Oil's run-up, which began in May and includes a 15% spike in the last two weeks, is pulling along gasoline, natural-gas and heating-oil futures. Each $1 increase in oil futures can lift other products 2.4 cents a gallon, says Doug MacIntyre, a senior analyst with the U.S. Energy Information Administration. But the effect on consumers usually doesn't happen overnight, says Mark Baxter, director of Southern Methodist University's Maguire Institute and a 28-year veteran of the oil industry. Despite the higher fuel prices, demand is holding up and keeping pressure on inventories. What sparked oil's rise?
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Oil prices are surging again, topping $50 a barrel on Nymex despite OPEC's assurance to keep the spigots wide open. Major concerns -- consumption in China, fading inventories in the U.S., and worries about terror and the stability of Yukos -- are keeping prices juiced. The final jolt came when Hurricane Ivan disrupted oil facilities in the Gulf of Mexico. Oil has a ways to go before reaching its inflation-adjusted high of near $80 a barrel after the Iranian revolution in 1980. But consumers, fresh off a costly summer at the gasoline pump, could still feel another pinch heating their homes this winter.
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