A planned pipeline closure in Washington State is being blamed for gas prices spiking 15 cents a litre in Metro Vancouver this week – even though prices only went up a penny south of the border.
Vancouver motorists saw an eight cent jump at the pumps overnight Wednesday alone, part of an ongoing surge analysts blame on pending maintenance at British Petroleum’s Olympia pipeline outside Bellingham.
“It means probably about half the gasoline used in our region won’t be able to get to terminals, and then will not be able to be distributed to various gas stations,” gas expert Dan McTeague from GasBuddy.com said.
But gas in Washington is only up four cents a gallon – or about one penny a litre – since last week. In Blaine, prices on Thursday translated to about 90 cents a litre.
Financial commentator Robert Levy said the difference is there are more supply sources available to gas stations in Washington.
“They are less sensitive to their own supply. They can go out and source gas from elsewhere across the U.S., they can bring it up from California,” Levy said.
“British Columbians, we’re so much more reliant on that one single market.”
The closure of BP’s pipeline is scheduled to begin on Monday and last about one week. Experts expect prices in Metro Vancouver to start dropping pretty quickly after the pipeline re-opens, probably by Nov. 20.
With a report from CTV Vancouver’s Shannon Paterson
