Gas Outages Hit the U.S. as Colonial Pipeline Remains Offline

Panic buying has hit gas stations in the Southeast as much of the Colonial Pipeline remains offline.

A latest report from GasBuddy has found that over half of the gas stations in North Carolina are out of fuel. GasBuddy data has found that 65% of the stations in the state are out of fuel. South Carolina and Georgia has 43% of its stations dry and Virginia has 44% of its stations without fuel.

The national average for a gallon of gas has increased over $3 on Wednesday for the first time in almost seven years.

Gasbuddy senior petroleum analyst Patrick De Haan noted that Tuesday’s gasoline demand soared 14.3% compared to the prior Tuesday, while week to date gasoline demand is up 10.7% week-over-week.

The outages are linked to panic buying by consumers and the Colonial Pipeline has said it plans to restore operations by the end of the week.

The Colonial Pipeline connects Gulf Coast refiners and the Eastern Seaboard, stretching over 5,000 miles and transporting almost half of the East Coast’s fuel.

The pipeline had taken its entire system down on Friday after it fell victim to a ransomware attack. This is the first time the entire pipeline has been shut down.

The cyberattack was by Russian ransomware group DarkSide.

Once activity is restored, it will still probably take at least a few days for operations to return to normal.

The Biden administration is asking drivers not to hoard gasoline.

“If this outage goes past the end of the week … prices could spike pretty dramatically,” said Kevin Book of Clearview Energy Partners.

“It’s very difficult to pin the exact amount prices may rise, but for now, it appears to be a few cents per gallon, possibly growing more significant if the pipeline remains shut down for more than 2-3 more days,” GasBuddy said in a blog post on Monday.