Lots of us were on the road traveling for the holidays this week, and you might've noticed paying less at the pump.
Gas prices in West Michigan are the lowest they’ve been since November 2016.
As of Thursday afternoon, average gas prices were about $2.07 a gallon in Grand Rapids. That’s down about 63 cents from last year.
“Prices in West Michigan, you’re probably the 170th least expensive out of almost 500 cities," said Dan McTeague, senior petroleum analyst at GasBuddy.com. "You're in the top tier, average prices right now across America are about $2.30, $2.29.”
GasBuddy reports Holland has the hottest prices in the state, where several stations hit $1.70 a gallon for unleaded on Thursday afternoon.
"The market is very, very erratic, volatile, has nothing to do with fundamentals on oil and gas, has everything to do with concerns about the stock market and whether or not there’s going to be a slow down," McTeague said. "But if there's not, lets say for instance United States and China gets their act together, look out, prices will walk right back up to where they were say back in October."
McTeague said prices could dip a few more cents over the next couple days, and stay in this range for several weeks. But he said prices could go back up by Memorial Day Weekend.
All this cheap fuel is mainly due to the collapse in oil prices.
“Oil is low because there is a glut of oil globally," McTeague said. "There was a thought at the beginning of October that we would have a shortage of oil, with Iran being sanctioned, it would no longer be able to sell its oil. The state department changed its mind, and that created a real glut. American production is at an all time high, Russian production all time high, Saudi Arabian production of oil at an all time high.”
For now, people like Collin Cromwell, a Shell Gas Station customer, are enjoying the extra bucks in their pocket.
“I work two jobs, so I often times commute a lot, which means I have to pump more often," Cromwell said. "And this is great.”
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