Another jump at the gas pump

Jonesboro, Arkansas – After a little respite, drivers in Natural State saw another spike at the pump.

According to a Monday report from GasBuddy.com, the average price of gasoline in Arkansas increased by 4.8 cents to $3.18 a gallon over the previous week.

That represents 1.9 cents more than drivers paid a year ago and 11.2 cents more than they spent last month.

The national average increased to $3.57 per gallon by 6.5 cents.

The head of GasBuddy’s petroleum analysis, Patrick De Haan, claims that last week’s oil prices reached a high of about $87 per barrel, the highest since October.

“We are not only facing the seasonal factors that push prices up—refinery maintenance, the switch to summer gasoline, and rising demand—but also escalating crude oil prices as OPEC’s production cuts continue to cause declining global oil inventories,” he said.

De Haan added that “escalations between Iran and Israel [are] adding to concerns of further destabilization.”