Crude oil prices rise above $61 per barrel

The price of crude oil was up again on Friday. While April contracts for Brent crude closed 39 cents higher in London to $61.01 per barrel, West Texas Intermediate crude for April delivery had gained 29 cents to $61.24 per barrel in afternoon trade on the New York Mercantile Exchange after going as high as $61.80 earlier in the day. That peak was the highest oil has traded at so far this year.

Prices on petroleum products were also higher. Gasoline was up a bit less than 1 cent to $1.755 per gallon, while heating oil gained 2.46 cents to $1.7496 per gallon. On the other hand, natural gas futures dropped 8.9 cents to $7.638 per 1,000 cubic feet.

Much of the price gains were blamed on the continuing dispute with Iran over its uranium enrichment activities. Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called Western complaints about his nation’s nuclear program “bullies”. Meanwhile, the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council and representatives from German planned to meet on Monday to consider a new resolution to try to persuade Iran to suspend its enrichment program after it did not do so as a UN deadline passed earlier in the week.

Other pressures sending crude prices up included more declines are expected in US inventories of gasoline and distillates as refineries continue to run at lower volumes. Last week, refineries only worked at 85.2 percent of capacity due to closures for maintenance.