Crude oil prices climbed above $65 a barrel in New York amid concern the U.S. won't have enough gasoline when the summer driving season starts next week.

Gasoline supplies fell 7.5 per cent below their five-year average during the week ended May 11, according to the U.S. Energy Department. ConocoPhillips and Murphy Oil Corp. shut refinery units for repairs last week, raising concern not enough gasoline was being produced.
People are worrying the U.S. is not able to cope with summer driving-season demand,'' said Edo Gerbrands, a trader with Fortis Bank in Brussels.

Crude oil for June delivery rose as much as 44 cents, or 0.7 per cent, to $65.38 a barrel in after-hours electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The June contract, which expires today, traded at $65.36 at 10:30 a.m. in London. The more-active July futures rose 35 cents to $66.33 a barrel.
The Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), the main militant group in Nigeria's Niger River Delta, said it had no plans to attack a refinery in Port Harcourt to protest the government's sale of its stake in the plant. The group may attack the pipeline that supplies crude to the refinery, Jomo Gbomo, a spokesman for MEND, said yesterday.

About 900,000 barrels a day of crude output have been halted in Nigeria, Africa's biggest oil producer, by militant attacks and local protests, according to Vienna-based PVM Oil Associates GmbH estimates.
Brent crude for July settlement rose as much as 87 cents, or 1.3 per cent, to $70.29 a barrel on the ICE Futures Exchange and traded at $70.24 at 10:31 a.m. in London.

Oil rose 4.1 per cent last week and was expected to extend its gain this week, according to a Bloomberg News survey of 40 analysts. Twenty, or 50 per cent, of those surveyed said last week oil prices would rise. Thirteen, or 33 per cent, said prices would decline and seven forecast little change.
The U.S. summer driving season, when gasoline demand peaks, begins with the Memorial Day holiday on May 28 and runs through Labor Day in early September. As the holiday approaches, a series of refinery halts has curbed production of gasoline.

Preem Petroleum AB, a Swedish oil refiner, will operate its 125,000-barrel-a-day Gothenburg refinery at reduced capacity for about three weeks after it resumes operations in early June, spokesman Thomas Oegren said. The refinery's heating-oil unit was damaged by a fire May 13 as the plant was starting up after maintenance.

Exxon Mobil Corp. restarted a 124,500-barrel-a-day crude distillation unit at its plant in Singapore that had been shut May 3 because of a fire that killed three workers.
Valero Energy Corp., the largest U.S. refiner, said a wet gas compressor failure caused flaring at its 295,000-barrel-a-day refinery in Port Arthur, Texas, on May 19.

ConocoPhillips plans to restart a 24,000-barrel-a-day fluid catalytic cracking unit at its Ponca City, Oklahoma, refinery early this week after unplanned repairs, the company said on Sunday.
"Over the weekend, the U.S. refining industry experienced a series of further glitches, which further threaten the supply,'' James Neale, a London-based analyst at Citigroup Global Markets Ltd., wrote yesterday in an e-mailed report. "The industry seems to continue to be struggling to find a supply response to the price signal.''

Gasoline for June delivery was at $2.414 a gallon in after- hours electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It has risen 51 per cent since the start of the year.
Oil and gas workers in Nigeria plan to stop work on May 24 to protest the sale of the state-run refinery, union leaders said on Sunday.

The strike, which would affect all Nigerian National Petroleum Corp. locations, can only be averted if the government agrees to talks, Elijah Okougbo, the secretary general of the National Union of Petroleum and Natural Gas Workers, said on Sunday.

Nigeria's Bureau of Public Enterprises last week sold the government's stake to Bluestar Oil Services Ltd. Consortium, a Nigerian group comprising Dangote Group, Zenon Oil, Transnational Corp. of Nigeria (Transcorp) and Rivers State for $561 million.

Expressed in U.S. dollars, West Texas Intermediate, the New York-traded benchmark, has fallen about 6 per cent in the past 12 months. Oil has dropped 11 per cent in euros, 11 per cent in British pounds. WTI price rose almost 2 per cent in yen.