SAN DIEGO — The average price of a gallon of self-serve regular gasoline in San Diego County dropped Sunday for the second consecutive day following a run of 23 increases in 25 days, decreasing 1.4 cents to $6.234.
The decreases stem from Gov. Gavin Newsom sending a letter to the California Air Resources Board late Thursday directing it to allow refineries to begin making and distributing winter-blend gasoline, which is cheaper to produce. Stations normally cannot start selling winter blend gas until Nov. 1.
"Spot gasoline markets collapsing today in California as a result of the CARB waiver.... down 84 cents per gallon for the LA/SoCal market and AZ gasoline produced in CA," Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, which provides real-time gas price information from more than 150,000 stations, wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, just before noon Friday.
"If this holds, this means that later tonight stations will be paying FAR less and will then slowly start passing it on. Other stations won't budge for a few days until they sell through more of their expensive gasoline... mid next week, declines ramp up across CA, AZ, NV."
The average price rose 86.7 cents during the run to its highest amount since Oct. 12, according to figures from the AAA and Oil Price Information Service. It rose 16 consecutive days, dropped a half-cent Sept. 21 and 1.5 cents Sept. 22, then resumed increasing Sept. 23.
The average price dropped one-tenth of a cent Saturday and is 20.2 cents more than one week ago and 86.8 cents higher than one month ago but 15 cents less than one year ago when the average price was approaching a record.
The average price has dropped 20.1 cents since rising to a record $6.435 on Oct. 5.
The national average price dropped for the 11th time in 13 days, decreasing eight-tenths of a cent to $3.815. It has dropped 6.6 cents over the past 13 days, including nine-tenths of a cent Saturday.
The national average price is 3.2 cents less than one week ago and three-tenths of a cents lower than one month ago but 1.5 cents more than one year ago. It has dropped $1.201 since rising to a record $5.016 on June 14, 2022.
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