For most of this winter, home heating oil prices averaged a little more than $4 a gallon, about 5 percent higher than last year.
But no more.
Since the bombing of Iran began last Saturday, average home heating oil prices in Massachusetts have spiked by one-third or more, with some consumers now paying close to $5.50 per gallon to heat their homes.
“The bombing in Iran impacted oil prices instantaneously,” said Michael Ferrante, president of the Massachusetts Energy Marketers Association, which represents home heating oil dealers.
“Oil dealers looked on with horror as the average price hit $5 a gallon and kept going up,” he said. “And the frightening thing is that prices could continue to rise.”
In fact, US crude oil futures climbed more than 10 percent on Friday. Crude oil is refined to produce heating oil, gasoline, and other fuels.
Ferrante said oil dealers do not profit from the spike in prices; they merely pass their increased costs along to their customers.
“The dealers are not happy about it,” he said. “The one positive is that we are coming to the end of the heating season, which should provide some price relief.”
In a note to its customers, Needham Oil Complete Heating and Cooling wrote that in “the few days after the war started, the price we pay [for wholesale supplies] jumped an amazing $1.50 per gallon.”
Needham Oil declined to speak on the record but called the price increase “almost unprecedented” in its note to customers.
“We know how frustrating it is,” the note says. “It’s extraordinarily frustrating for us as well and creates tremendous pressure on our business.”
“We have no way of knowing what will happen tomorrow,” the note says. “In the past, we’ve seen prices plummet just as quickly as they’ve spiked.”
Needham Oil said its highest priority is ensuring customers “have enough supply to keep your home safe and warm.”
A customer of a different oil company on the North Shore, Tom Driscoll, wrote to the Globe to say he paid $3.99 per gallon for a delivery on Monday, but the price of oil is now listed on his dealer’s website as $5.49 a gallon, a 38 percent increase in five days.
Had he taken delivery Friday instead of four days earlier, he would have paid $250 more for 168 gallons of oil, Driscoll said.
“We are so glad it’s March instead of November,” he wrote.
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