NAF Chairman Magne Revheim, who represents an organization with more than 500 000 members, is today launching a campaign against greedy oil companies that are unwilling to lower their petrol prices.
The oil price is dropping, and so are the petrol prices in our neighbouring countries, but in Norway petrol prices remain unchanged. Yesterday the petrol station chain, YX Energy, raised their petrol prices. Today they are reducing them. But the recommended retail price on petrol is still at the same level as it was when the international oil price was at its highest, Nok 13.23 per litre for 95 Octane.
The oil price is dropping, and so are the petrol prices in our neighbouring countries, but in Norway petrol prices remain unchanged. Yesterday the petrol station chain, YX Energy, raised their petrol prices. Today they are reducing them. But the recommended retail price on petrol is still at the same level as it was when the international oil price was at its highest, Nok 13.23 per litre for 95 Octane.
- This is unacceptable. The motorists in this country are being taken for fools. We are sick and tired of oil companies that refuse to lower petrol prices when the oil price drops. We are going to take direct measures against the oil companies, we simply won’t accept this behaviour anymore, Chairman of NAF, Magne Revheim says.
- What exactly does NAF intend to do?
- We will encourage motorists to only buy petrol from the stations that have the lowest prices, and from those stations that reduce their prices quickest.
Challenging StatoilHydro
A lot of members has contacted NAF in the last couple of days to vent their frustrations over the high prices.
- Yes, we do receive calls from people who’ve had enough. And I can understand their frustration. They are the ones who have to pay for it. With today’s low international oil price, petrol should only cost around NOK 10 per litre, Revheim says.
Revheim also feels that Statoil should be the first oil company to lower their petrol prices.
- Statoil is a partly State owned company, and that means that the Norwegian people are co-owners. I demand on their behalf, and on behalf of our 500 000 members that Statoil immediately reduce their petrol prices and bring it in line with the oil price.
Are blaming the market
But Statoil has done nothing about petrol prices even though the international price of oil has dropped dramatically. When the oil peaked at US$ 146 per barrel in July, petrol prices in Norway rose dramatically. It peaked at NOK 13,83 at Statoil’s filling stations. Today the retail price is NOK 13.23
Since July the international price of oil has fallen by 37 percent. Statoil’s retail price on petrol has however only fallen by 4.4 percent.
Denmark is different
- The international price of oil is only one of the factors that determine petrol prices. Because there is so much competition in the petrol market, the price of petrol hasn’t fallen as much as the oil price, spokesperson for StatoilHydro, Knut H. Hansen says.
Today petrol prices in Denmark will drop by NOK 0.50. XY Energy’s CEO Christian Hoff, who himself is based in Denmark explains why Norwegian motorists won’t see a similar reduction in petrol prices in their country.
-Denmark is a very different market. The competition in Denmark is so fierce that in the last couple of years the oil companies simply haven’t made any money on petrol at all. In Norway we only have to deal with the Norwegian market.
The price of petrol at Shell’s filling stations in Norway yesterday was NOK 13,39 per litre 95 octane.
This price could be adjusted later today, spokesperson for Shell Norway, Kim Bye Bruun says.
- We will make a decision, and most likely adjust the price on Thursday. I don’t know now by how much. I will have to go over the petrol reserve numbers from the USA first, Bruun says
Source: VG Nett
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