By Andrew Follett
The average American now pays less than $1.80 for a gallon of gasoline. Prices today are the lowest they’ve been since 2009 but can vary a great deal depending on the state.
A report published Thursday by the American Automobile Association determined that the U.S’s highest gas prices can be found in Hawaii and California, which pay an average of $2.55 and $2.43 per gallon of gasoline, respectively. America’s lowest gas prices are in Arizona and South Carolina, which respectively pay an average of $1.55 and $1.56 per gallon of gasoline.
Source: American Automobile Association
Federal government energy experts predict the national average gas price will remain below $2.00 a gallon for the year — the lowest projection since 2004. Just last year, consumers paid an annual average gasoline price of $2.40 per gallon.
The low gas prices are due to the cheap oil and cheap natural gas-fired electricity provided by fracking and horizontal drilling. Energy prices dropped 41 percent over the course of 2015 due to hydraulic fracturing, or fracking. Other commodities fell in price as well, but not nearly as much as energy, according to the Energy Information Administration.
Fracking even helped America surpass Russia early in 2015 as the world’s largest and fastest-growing producer of oil. Consequentially, crude prices have fallen more than 60 percent since last summer. American oil production has increased by 75 percent over the last seven years.
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