Metro Van gas prices are the highest in North America and getting higher

Gas prices in Metro Vancouver are the highest in North America right now, and they’re likely to get even higher.

It’s a hard time to be a driver in the city, with prices soaring to $1.86.9 in Metro Vancouver.

The cost of gas increased by five cents a litre overnight on the first day of March, and experts predict they’ll continue to rise.

On February 25 and 26, prices at the pump in Vancouver reached all-time highs following a very expensive January.
Not a very uplifting flex, is it?

Here comes the gas price hikes!#Vancouver #gasprices pic.twitter.com/CU5VNkyEtv

— Andrew Bergink (@BADGERxxxFACE) March 2, 2022

Professor of Finance at SFU’s School of Business, Andrey Pavlov, says the reasons behind the surge are more complicated than it seems.

A combination of Russian sanctions during their invasion of Ukraine, municipal and provincial fossil fuel-related taxes, and supply shortages all have a part to play, he says.

“On one hand, we have very high gas taxes, and it’s not just the taxes themselves. There are some requirements to provide certain types of fuel that are very costly to produce,” says Pavlov.

“The other issue is we have very limited refinement capacity [in the Lower Mainland], so then we probably pay a lot to transport gasoline even if we have access to crude oil.”

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Russia is a major oil producer, and without them, the world supply is coming from the Middle East, the United States, and Canada.

“But that supply, however big it is, may not be enough to replace the supply coming out of Russia entirely, and certainly not in the short run, so that generates a shortage and of course, that pushes the price up,” says Pavlov.

Gas going to 194.9 on Thurs. Why is it so expensive to step outside in Vancouver

— KC (@kmichelle_98) March 2, 2022

Since there’s no foreseeable end to those issues right now, gas prices are likely to keep rising.