New year brings new, higher gas prices

By Jim Hagerty
Staff Writer

Rockford area drivers were welcomed with higher gas prices Monday, Jan. 3, as the first work week of the year was underway.

According to stats at RockfordGasPrices.com, pump prices are up more than 44 cents from Jan. 1, 2010.

As of Monday morning, an average of $3.16 was the going rate for a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline. The price is slightly more than 4 cents higher than last week and about 11 cents more than drivers are paying across the country.

Over New Year’s weekend, area stations were getting as much $3.19 per gallon.

Nationally, 2010 ended with gas prices hovering around the $3.06 mark.

Moving forward, Illinois, with some of the highest fuel prices in the country, is expected to remain an expensive state.

With crude oil on the climb, some economists predict gas prices to reach $3.75 per gallon by spring and could reach $4, or more, by the end of the year.

Crude oil is expected to hit $100 per barrel sometime in 2011.

When crude oil rose to $147 per barrel in 2008, national pump prices reached just a little more than $4.1o, before falling to $1.65 by January 2009.

“We learned in 2008 that when things become a little untethered, what comes up often comes down,” Tom Kloza, an analyst for the Oil Price Information Service, said.