Full tank of diesel breaks £100 mark as Iran oil crisis deepens

The cost of filling a typical family car with diesel has exceeded £100 for the first time in more than three years, new figures show.

Average diesel prices at UK forecourts on Tuesday were 182.8p per litre, up 40p since the start of the conflict in the Middle East on February 28, the RAC said.

That means it costs £100.52 to fill a 55-litre family car, breaching the £100 mark for the first time since December 2022.

The average cost of petrol is 152.8p per litre, an increase of 20p since the war began.

RAC head of policy Simon Williams said: “RAC analysis of wholesale fuel data points towards the price of petrol potentially stabilising if the cost of oil doesn’t increase further, although diesel still looks likely to rise.”

Oil prices – which have a significant effect on the cost of wholesale fuel – have soared in response to Iran’s stranglehold on tankers passing through the Strait of Hormuz.

Data compiled from pump price comparison website PetrolPrices.com shows a litre of diesel costs up to 217.0p at some forecourts in rural Scotland.

The UK’s most expensive petrol is being sold for 199.9p per litre at Avenue Garage in Northwich, Cheshire.

The most expensive motorway service area for diesel is Euro Garages’ Rivington Services on the M61 in Bolton, Greater Manchester, where the price is 200.9p per litre.

Welcome Break’s Woodall Services on the M1 in Sheffield has the highest price for petrol, at 189.9p per litre.

Motoring research charity the RAC Foundation estimated that rises in pump prices have led to motorists paying an additional £544 million for petrol and diesel.

This consists of £409 million for diesel and £135 million for petrol.

The figures are based on average daily pump price rises and last year’s fuel consumption rate.

Steve Gooding, director of the RAC Foundation, said at the current rate that fuel prices are rising, the war “will have cost motorists at least a billion pounds at the forecourt within the next couple of weeks”.

The AA said the petrol price gap between supermarket and non-supermarket retailers has widened from 5.4p per litre before the war began to 7.6p per litre.

Diesel has an even bigger disparity at 8.8p per litre.

The AA said the widening price difference helps explain why many drivers were “drawn to the supermarkets” last weekend, which led to “pressure” on their fuel supplies.

On Tuesday, the Government published a list of some of the third-party fuel-price apps and websites using pump price data from its Fuel Finder scheme.

They include Confused.com, DriveScore, Fuel Finder UK, Fuel Spy, MotorMouth, PetrolPrices.com, RAC Fuel Watch and the AA.

All UK forecourts have been required to report price changes to the Fuel Finder database within half an hour of a change since February 2.