CENTRE COUNTY, Pa. (WTAJ) — The conflict in Iran may have only started Saturday, but the impact on gas prices has been swift.
As the fighting continues in the Middle East, there is a growing impact on oil and gas prices. Brad Andrew, a professor of economics at Juniata College, said the Middle East is a large supplier of oil. Now that there has been a disruption in that area, he says to expect a spike in gas prices.
“Locally, gas prices at Sheetz increased to $3.49 a gallon,” Andrew said. “And that’s up from last week.”
The spike in price has not been limited to just gas, either.
“The price of oil right now is several dollars per barrel higher than it was yesterday,” Seth Blumsack, professor of energy policy and economics at Penn State, said.
Blumsack said the oil trade is not limited to a few countries — it is a “global market.”
“When you have conflict or something that happens even in one particular part of the world, that shock like reverberates throughout the entire global oil economy,” he said.
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Andrew suspects Iran may be in trouble even after the dust settles, which in turn could disrupt oil prices enough to raise costs on the supply chain.
“We don’t really know what’s going to happen to Iran,” Andrew said. ‘There’ll be a power vacuum. It wouldn’t be surprising if there was a lot of turmoil within the country, really no effective government.”
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