Oil prices have doubled from where they were a year ago, surpassing yet another record of $133 US yesterday.
Yet the prices at the pump, while painfully high, have not risen in tandem.
According to this week’s pump price survey by energy consulting firm MJ Ervin, Canadians paid on average $1.27 to fill up their tanks. Last May the average price was about $1.12 per litre. It’s a significant increase, but not nearly as dramatic as that of crude oil, which was worth $66 US a barrel last May.
Every May, Petro-Canada posts a gas-price pie chart at its stations across Canada explaining to consumers the breakdown of the final pump price.
This year’s recently-released posters say 48 per cent of the price was from crude oil; 32 per cent was taxes; 17 per cent was refining costs and the 3 per cent left over was profit.
When Petro-Canada first started posting the gas price pie chart in 2000, crude costs only took up 30 per cent of the pie, while taxes were 51 per cent, according to the company’s Pump Talk blog.
