The 'summer blend' -- while it sounds like a great cup of coffee, it's actually a change made in gasoline over the warm months meant to help cut emissions and ultimately smog.
Unfortunately, it often also means higher prices at the pump. But this year? The summer blend is nice and mellow and cheaper than before.
Patrick DeHaan explained to WWJ Newsradio that the EPA has various requirements for summer blend across the country depending on the population of a certain area.
Specifically, he said, "The more vehicles on the road, essentially the cleaner the blend of gasoline because during summer when the ambient air temperatures are warmer, we can see more of a reaction between all the vehicles emissions and air pollution."
So, big cities like New York, Detroit, Chicago, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, Minneapolis and more have different gas in the summer than at other times of the year. Studies from the EPA are part of the reason for that and those studies are why we don't see diesel that's as dirty.
"Gasoline has been relatively cleaner just because the nature of heavy oils," DeHaas said. "And I'm going to point out diesel because I'm sure we all can remember decades ago how sooty diesel was all the time. And now you see a semi-truck, you have certified clean idle where you don't see any of that soot anymore. There's less sulfur in both gasoline and diesel and that does a lot to reduce pollution in the summer."
And there's more good news for the cleaner summer gas you're buying is that DeHaan says, "I believe will have slightly lower prices" in 2025.
"Typically, there is quite a bit more of an increase when we make the transition from winter to summer gasoline. We start feeling the increase usually in March ... But we really haven't seen much of an increase between what we're paying in December and where we are today. Metro Detroit is $3.08 a gallon. Now we've been kind of dancing below $3 some days, above $3 other days, but this is really not too much of a departure."
Usually, during an average spring, gas prices could be 20 to 75 cents a gallon higher than winter. We haven't seen that this year, DeHaan said, partially because OPEC is producing more oil this year, which has actively pushed the price of oil down.
The availability has also cut down on the usual fluctuations, DeHaan added, because while usually prices change from week to week and month to month, gas prices has pretty much held steady the last few months at $3 a gallon.
"Some days, we've been a little bit below $3 here and there. Some days as high as about $3.21. And looking at Metro Detroit, where we've really been for the last six months is as low as $2.95. The average has gone as high about $3.20 a gallon. So that's actually a pretty tight range when you talk about six months. Typically gas prices are much lower in the winter and quite a bit higher in the spring and summer."
DeHaan added a little known fact: A lot of stations say they really don't make as much money on gas as they earn by selling coffee and Slurpees and donuts and the rest of our arsenal of road snacks.
"A lot more income is generated in the convenience (part) where margins are generally better ... Stations are certainly making a little bit more at the pump than they used to. But they're not making the five or ten or fifteen cents a gallon anymore. If you're doing well on a station on an average day, you may make 20 or 25 cents a gallon. But when you put that in comparison to the $3 a gallon, that's still kind of a lower margin (than snacks)."
Gas prices are higher, specifically in California, where as of mid-May 2025, the average price is $4.85 per gallon, far above the national average of $3.26, according to GasBuddy and AAA. The Daily Economy noted that higher prices are specific to California and they're due to "decades of state-level tax hikes, regulatory overreach, and misguided climate mandates that have warped the gasoline market in California."
So, what's going to happen there this summer?
"I really don't see much that I could predict right now," DeHaas said. "I mean, I think it's going to be probably the best summer since 2021 with the lowest prices, but there can be unexpected refining disruptions. And I would say the other thing this year, you know, we've been talking about the potential for trade and tariffs, something that really could hit Detroit in a significant way. That is something that could hit oil and gas prices because much of the oil that's refined in Metro Detroit and areas like Toledo and Sarnia comes from Canada.
"So keep an eye on that, but I'm not expecting any shocks in terms of pump prices right now and I do think that most of the summer will probably some days be seeing prices below three dollars and some days maybe a little bit slightly above the three dollar mark but it should be the lowest summer in the last few years."