Fuel prices in Northern Ireland make their biggest weekly jump since spring spike following bombing of Iran
Prices of road fuel and home heating oil have surged unusually steeply in the past week, new data shows.
According to the Consumer Council for Northern Ireland, the average price of 900 litres of home heating oil went from £887 last Thursday to £1,007 today.
That is an increase of £120 in the space of a week, and means the price of the fuel is once again back up to well above £1 per litre, even when bought in bulk.
That is the biggest single-week spike since the start of March when the US and Israel started bombing Iran, at which point 900 litres of home heating oil leapt from £547 to £948 in the space of seven days – a jump of £401.
It is still not back at the peak of £1,089 that it reached in early April, but if its current trajectory continues then by next Thursday it will have exceeded that price.
At the same time, the price of petrol in Northern Ireland has stepped up sharply in the past seven days, going from an average of 157.1ppl to 164.1 – a difference of 7p.
Diesel has gone from 177.9ppl last Thursday to 185.6ppl today – up 7.7p.
Neither petrol nor diesel have seen a one-week jump like that since the immediate aftermath of the Iran attack in the spring.
Petrol is now at its most expensive since the war began, while diesel is nearly back at its April peak of 188.1ppl.
The price of a barrel of crude oil has been steadily increasing since the start of July, from slightly over $70 to now well over $100.
Ulster University economist Esmond Birnie says that another factor driving up prices is the government’s £100-per-household home heating oil subsidy.