The price of a gallon of No. 2 heating oil in Maine is back around $5.00 per gallon, according to information tracked by the Maine governor’s office and the federal government.
In other words, a Maine resident who needs 1,000 gallons to keep warm during the winter will pay more than $5,000 — an increase of almost $2,500 over prices last year at this time.
Democratic Maine Gov. Janet Mills last week circulated a tip sheet for surviving Maine winter with high energy costs in which she blamed the price increases on the Russian invasion of Ukraine without citing any evidence.
In the weeks prior to the Feb. 24, 2022 start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, heating oil sold in Maine for between $3.00 and $3.20 per gallon. When Mills entered office in January 2019, heating oil was $2.08, according to federal data.
Heating oil prices began rising sharply after the 2020 presidential election, when Democratic President Joe Biden won the White House and the Democratic Party won both houses of Congress. Biden pledged throughout the campaign to end the American fossil fuel industry by restrict domestic energy exploration and production.
The week of Nov. 9, 2020, the price per gallon of heating oil was $1.27.
You can review the historical and current price of heating oil here.