The price of 47 cents per gallon would have been unfathomable five years ago.
Due to the current surge in oil supply, paired with an ongoing gas price war waged between several companies, gas prices fall below $1 in parts of Michigan. The US citizens near Houghton Lake, Michigan, were the first in the whole country which could benefit from prices that were marked at 47 cents per gallon on Sunday, the 17th of January.
After this news reached the ears of the public, some rather lengthy lines were formed by people attempting to fill up their cars. Several police units were deployed in order to facilitate the flow of traffic.
These low prices were discovered by GasBuddy, a company that allows people to see gas prices around the country in order to be able to choose from the cheapest option available. After several pictures with the stations’ gas prices were uploaded using the GasBuddy smartphone app, people rushed from all across the state towards the Valero and B & B Market gas stations.
At B&B Market, a gallon was marked at around 53 cents while, at Valero, the cost was even lower, reaching 47 cents. More than 500 cars were lined up at each of these stations accordingly. The Gas War waged between the two competing gas stations has been around for a couple of months up to this point.
Unfortunately for those that wanted to benefit from these low costs, prices went back up at regular $1.50 levels at 9 p.m. on Sunday. Nonetheless, this phenomenon can still be considered as the tip of the iceberg, not just for Michigan, but for the entire country, if oil prices continue to fall over the course of 2016.
If prices will continue to stay at these levels in the next few months, in some cases even falling below the $1 mark, auto experts are expecting car sales to continue their current hike. The problem is the fact that because of the low price of gas, the general public has started to opt for less fuel efficient cars, in regards to consumption, to the detriment of their more environmentally friendly counterparts.
It is currently unclear how this gas price plummet will affect consumer behavior in the next few months, as well as how the environment will fare. By choosing a car which has a bigger gas consumption rate, the amount of greenhouse gas and pollutant emissions increase accordingly.
Even if the fact that gas prices fall below $1 in parts of Michigan is no longer available, with prices being raised to their normal levels as of Sunday night, the odds that more gas stations will drop prices over the course of 2016 are above average. But this is directly linked to both the status of the general oil market and consumer behavior as well.
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