Americans in the Midwest, Rockies and Great Lakes regions may want to brace for gas price hikes if the U.S. places tariffs on Canadian oil, energy expert Patrick De Haan warned Thursday.
“[The impact would be] certainly unbalanced,” De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, told FOX Business’ Stuart Varney.
“And who will be impacted?” he continued. “Primarily, motorists in the Great Lakes could see gas prices shooting up in excess of $0.20 a gallon. A lot of that Canadian crude oil flows directly down into areas like the Great Lakes, the Midwest, the Rocky Mountains regions, where it may be difficult to find different sources of crude oil.”
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“Having said that, the pressure on Canada is undermining the price of western Canadian oil. It’s down to about $60 a barrel today, but this certainly is still likely to have some bite for motorists in the Great Lakes, the Rockies and the Midwest.”
Even the Northeast, which is reliant on Canada’s St. John and Irving oil refineries, could potentially take a hit.
“That would be an impact, though, on refined products, so the Northeast could be subject to those tariffs that finalize products like diesel fuel and jet fuel, and gasoline does flow from that Canadian refinery to the northeastern United States as well, so there could be some spillover to other regions,” De Haan explained.
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President Donald Trump has long threatened to impose 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico, two of the U.S.’ largest suppliers of crude oil, unless the countries take action to stop the flow of illegal immigrants and fentanyl into the U.S.
During her first press briefing on Tuesday, White House spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt reaffirmed Trump’s plan to impose the tariffs on Feb. 1.
Reuters contributed to this report.
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