Price of a barrel of oil could surge to $150: comment

"Such an increase in the price of oil could see a litre of petrol jumping to around £1.90 - a price last seen in 2022 after Russian's invasion of Ukraine - adding over £500 to the average fuel bill of a British petrol car driver.  

"But with 1.8m EVs now on the UK's roads, an increasing number of British drivers are insulated from these spikes in international energy markets. Accelerating the transition to EVs – increasingly powered by electrons generated by British wind and solar farms – is one of the most effective things the UK can do to end its dependency on foreign oil and protect its drivers from volatile markets over which we have no control". 

Recent analysis by the ECIU [3] of the past relationship between the price of a barrel of oil and the price of a litre of petrol in the UK has found that oil trading at $100 a barrel could see the price of a litre of petrol jumping from 135p today [4] to 150p – this would cost drivers doing 8,000 miles a year almost £140 more to fill their cars. Were the price of a barrel of oil to jump to $120, the price of petrol could increase to around 170p a litre, increasing annual fuelling costs by over £320 a year. In the case of oil hitting $150 a barrel, the petrol could hit £1.90 a litre, and see fuelling costs increasing by over £500 a year.

Meanwhile, price caps on the cost of electricity in place until June this year will shield drivers of EVs from the shocks we are currently seeing in global energy markets.  At present, EVs are already over £870 a year cheaper to charge than a petrol car is to fuel. Were the price of a barrel of oil to jump to $100, those savings could jump to over £1,000 a year. Were a barrel of oil to hit $120, they would jump to almost £1,200 a year. If oil hit $150 a barrel, savings would jump to £1380.