Crude oil prices up on supply report

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NEW YORK, Sept. 30 (UPI) -- Crude oil prices surged to close to $80 per barrel in New York Thursday after the Energy Information Administration said crude oil stockpiles had declined.

Crude oil prices have added close to $3 per barrel since the EIA said oil inventories fell by 500,000 barrels in the week ending Sept. 27 to 357.9 million. By itself, the decline was not large, but inventories of gasoline dropped as well, falling by 3.5 million barrels while heating oil supplies fell by 1.3 million barrels.

At the New York Mercantile Exchange, November delivery light, sweet crude oil added $1.98 overnight to $79.84 per barrel. Heating oil prices rose 5.36 cents from a recent settlement to $2.2649 per gallon. Reformulated gasoline blendstock prices rose 4.86 cents to $2.0315 per gallon.

Henry Hub natural gas prices shed 10.3 cents from a prior settlement to $3.859 per million British thermal units.

At the retail level, the national average price of unleaded gasoline was $2.689 Thursday, down from Wednesday's $2.692, AAA said.