GRAND RAPIDS, Michigan. — Here in the United States, we are now seeing some of the immediate impacts of the conflict on our gas prices. Oil futures have shot up 10 percent since the start of the conflict.
Even before the conflict began, and as soon as temperatures started to warm up, prices at the pump began to rise.
I collected data from GasBuddy, comparing the average price of a gallon of gas between winter and summer.
On Jan. 1, 2025, Michigan drivers were paying an average of $2.94 a gallon, whereas on July 1, 2024, they were paying an average of $3.52 a gallon, a difference of nearly 60 cents.
While supply and demand play a role in these numbers—more people tend to travel during the summer months—the main reason for the price hike at the pump in the summer is a change in blends.
“The cost of summer gasoline is much higher, but because it has to burn cleaner, those cleaner-burning components tend to be much more expensive,” GasBuddy analyst Patrick De Haan said.
According to De Haan, in the warmer months, gas has a greater chance of evaporation from your car’s fuel system, allowing for more pollution. A cleaner blend has a lower evaporation rate, meaning fewer emissions. The winter blend allows gas to ignite more easily in colder temperatures. That blend isn’t as clean and is cheaper to produce, resulting in lower gas prices in the fall and winter.
“Winter gasoline has more butane,” De Haan said.
“In the summer, that cheap butane is gone, and about a $4 or $5-gallon alkyl is replacing those cheaper components.”
Generally speaking, the cheaper fall blend will start flowing into gas stations in the area around late September, and that blend will stay at the pump until about mid-May or early June.
