With no relief in sight, the political rhetoric around gas prices has intensified heading into the November election. Gov. Gavin Newsom has criticized President Donald Trump for saying it\u2019s a small price to pay<\/a> to keep Iran from developing nuclear weapons. Steve Hilton, the Republican running to succeed Newsom, has said he\u2019ll bring gas prices down to $3 a gallon by trimming state taxes and environmental programs<\/a> that contribute to higher fuel costs in the state. Xavier Becerra, his Democratic opponent, said Hilton\u2019s plan would roll back the state\u2019s environmental protections<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n So what\u2019s up with California\u2019s especially high gas prices? State officials and industry experts at AAA point to higher state taxes and other added costs for environmental programs, unique fuel blend requirements to reduce air pollution, an isolated market and more limited industry infrastructure, including refinery capacity and pipelines.<\/p>\n \u201cShort answer is, California gas prices are among the most expensive in the U.S. due to unique environmental regulations and taxes,\u201d said\u00a0Doug Johnson, communications lead with\u00a0AAA Mountain West Group. \u201cWith more cars than any other state, California also has higher demand.\u201d<\/p>\n The California Energy Commission notes that the state\u2019s fuel market is isolated \u2014 no pipelines bring gasoline in from other states \u2014 and the California\u2019s fuel blend requirements mean it can\u2019t use gas from other states. Limited refinery capacity means unexpected maintenance issues can create shortages and price spikes.<\/p>\n While California\u2019s consumption of oil, from which gasoline is refined, is less today than it was 30 years ago, the state is far more reliant on foreign oil supplies, which the California Energy Commission says means that \u201cinternational supply shocks may last longer for Californians because resupply time is longer.\u201d<\/p>\n California 30 years ago produced nearly half the oil consumed in the state, with more than 40% coming from Alaska and less than 10% from foreign suppliers. Today, California produces just 23% of its oil, with 16% from Alaska and more than 60% from foreign sources, mostly from the Middle East and Central and South America.<\/p>\n According to the U.S. Department of Energy, California\u2019s 63-cent per gallon state gas tax is the highest in the country and more than double the 29-cent national average. The gas tax is 20 cents in Texas, 22 cents in Florida and 8 cents in New York. The California Energy Commission says the state\u2019s tax funds road repairs, highway maintenance, bridge safety, public transit, and bicycle and pedestrian projects.<\/p>\n State sales taxes and fees, such as the underground storage tank fee, add 10 cents a gallon to California\u2019s total state cost, almost twice the 6 cent national average. Texas doesn\u2019t charge such fees, Florida\u2019s are 18 cents and New York\u2019s are 16 cents.<\/p>\n There also are local sales taxes.<\/p>\n California\u2019s environmental and climate programs add costs as well. They include the Cap-and-Invest Program<\/a>, formerly known as Cap-and-Trade, which creates financial incentives to reduce major sources of gases linked to rising global temperatures. That adds 26 cents to the price of a gallon of regular, according to the California Energy Commission. And the Low Carbon Fuel Standard<\/a>, which creates financial incentives to reduce emissions of those gases in the transportation sector, and adds 21 cents a gallon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"While the ongoing war with Iran has contributed to inflated gasoline costs across the country, today\u2019s national average…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":494624,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[387,7,9,8,400,383,643,147,181,100,13,385,1969],"class_list":["post-494623","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-business","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-california-politics","tag-economy","tag-environment","tag-gas-prices","tag-latest-headlines","tag-news","tag-politics","tag-regional","tag-retail"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/494623","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=494623"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/494623\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/494624"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=494623"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=494623"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=494623"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Graphic](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/SJM-L-GASPRICE-1013-90x.webp\")
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