The Hidden $40-Per-Barrel Cost Driving Oil Prices Higher

When Americans think about the price of oil, they usually focus on the number quoted every day in financial markets. If Brent crude is trading above $100 a barrel or West Texas Intermediate is near $100, those numbers become shorthand for whether oil is expensive or cheap. But that market price is only part of what ultimately determines the cost of getting crude oil to a refinery. But transportation has become a cost that has become impossible to ignore. Reuters recently reported that shipping roughly 2 million barrels of crude from the United…