IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ecolet/v209y2021ics0165176521003992.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The effect of the Colonial Pipeline shutdown on gasoline prices

Author

Listed:
  • Tsvetanov, Tsvetan
  • Slaria, Srishti

Abstract

On May 7, 2021, the Colonial Pipeline system was shut down for 6 days in response to a cyberattack. Using daily regular gasoline price data at the city level and employing a difference-in-differences approach to address potential demand-side confounding factors, we find that the shutdown led to a 4 cents-per-gallon increase in average gasoline prices in affected areas, with the estimated impact varying across locations based on their access to alternative means of fuel supply. Although the overall effect was initially slow, it persisted even after the reopening of the pipeline.

Suggested Citation

  • Tsvetanov, Tsvetan & Slaria, Srishti, 2021. "The effect of the Colonial Pipeline shutdown on gasoline prices," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 209(C).
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecolet:v:209:y:2021:i:c:s0165176521003992
    DOI: 10.1016/j.econlet.2021.110122
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0165176521003992
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.econlet.2021.110122?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Crosignani, Matteo & Macchiavelli, Marco & Silva, André F., 2023. "Pirates without borders: The propagation of cyberattacks through firms’ supply chains," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 147(2), pages 432-448.
    2. Shanjun Li & Joshua Linn & Erich Muehlegger, 2014. "Gasoline Taxes and Consumer Behavior," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 6(4), pages 302-342, November.
    3. Jonathan E. Hughes & Christopher R. Knittel & Daniel Sperling, 2008. "Evidence of a Shift in the Short-Run Price Elasticity of Gasoline Demand," The Energy Journal, International Association for Energy Economics, vol. 29(1), pages 113-134.
    4. Benjamin Atkinson, 2008. "On Retail Gasoline Pricing Websites: Potential Sample Selection Biases and Their Implications for Empirical Research," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 33(2), pages 161-175, September.
    5. David P. Byrne, 2019. "Gasoline Pricing in the Country and the City," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 55(2), pages 209-235, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Zhaoming Yang & Qi Xiang & Yuxuan He & Shiliang Peng & Michael Havbro Faber & Enrico Zio & Lili Zuo & Huai Su & Jinjun Zhang, 2023. "Resilience of Natural Gas Pipeline System: A Review and Outlook," Energies, MDPI, vol. 16(17), pages 1-19, August.
    2. Percia David, Dimitri & Maréchal, Loïc & Lacube, William & Gillard, Sébastien & Tsesmelis, Michael & Maillart, Thomas & Mermoud, Alain, 2023. "Measuring security development in information technologies: A scientometric framework using arXiv e-prints," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 188(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Bergeaud, Antonin & Raimbault, Juste, 2020. "An empirical analysis of the spatial variability of fuel prices in the United States," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 132(C), pages 131-143.
    2. Donna, Javier D., 2018. "Measuring Long-Run Price Elasticities in Urban Travel Demand," MPRA Paper 90059, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    3. Noel, Michael D. & Qiang, Hongjie, 2019. "The role of information in retail gasoline price dispersion," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 173-187.
    4. Silvia Tiezzi & Stefano F. Verde, 2017. "The signaling effect of gasoline taxes and its distributional implications," RSCAS Working Papers 2017/06, European University Institute.
    5. Gillingham, Kenneth & Munk-Nielsen, Anders, 2019. "A tale of two tails: Commuting and the fuel price response in driving," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 27-40.
    6. Allcott, Hunt & Mullainathan, Sendhil & Taubinsky, Dmitry, 2014. "Energy policy with externalities and internalities," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 112(C), pages 72-88.
    7. Shaw, Charles, 2020. "Econometric Analysis of Demand for Petrol in India, 1966-2019," MPRA Paper 104797, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Laurence Levin & Matthew S. Lewis & Frank A. Wolak, 2017. "High Frequency Evidence on the Demand for Gasoline," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 9(3), pages 314-347, August.
    9. Pier Basaglia & Sophie Behr & Moritz A. Drupp, 2023. "De-Fueling Externalities: How Tax Salience and Fuel Substitution Mediate Climate and Health Benefits," Discussion Papers of DIW Berlin 2041, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research.
    10. Tilov, Ivan & Weber, Sylvain, 2023. "Heterogeneity in price elasticity of vehicle kilometers traveled: Evidence from micro-level panel data," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 127(PA).
    11. Langer, Ashley & Maheshri, Vikram & Winston, Clifford, 2017. "From gallons to miles: A disaggregate analysis of automobile travel and externality taxes," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 152(C), pages 34-46.
    12. Yeh, Sonia & Burtraw, Dallas & Sterner, Thomas & Greene, David, 2021. "Tradable performance standards in the transportation sector," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 102(C).
    13. Michael Bates & Seolah Kim, 2019. "Estimating the Price Elasticity of Gasoline Demand in Correlated Random Coefficient Models with Endogeneity," Working Papers 202021, University of California at Riverside, Department of Economics, revised Jul 2020.
    14. Levin, Laurence & Lewis, Matthew S. & Wolak, Frank A., 2022. "Reference dependence in the demand for gasoline," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 197(C), pages 561-578.
    15. Silvia Tiezzi & Stefano F. Verde, 2019. "The signaling effect of gasoline taxes and its distributional implications," The Journal of Economic Inequality, Springer;Society for the Study of Economic Inequality, vol. 17(2), pages 145-169, June.
    16. Pier Basaglia & Sophie M. Behr & Moritz A. Drupp, 2023. "De-Fueling Externalities: Causal Effects of Fuel Taxation and Mediating Mechanisms for Reducing Climate and Pollution Costs," CESifo Working Paper Series 10508, CESifo.
    17. Kenneth Gillingham & David Rapson & Gernot Wagner, 2016. "The Rebound Effect and Energy Efficiency Policy," Review of Environmental Economics and Policy, Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 10(1), pages 68-88.
    18. Shou-Yung Yin & Chu-An Liu & Chang-Ching Lin, 2021. "Focused Information Criterion and Model Averaging for Large Panels With a Multifactor Error Structure," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 39(1), pages 54-68, January.
    19. Agostini, Claudio A. & Jiménez, Johanna, 2015. "The distributional incidence of the gasoline tax in Chile," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 85(C), pages 243-252.
    20. Goetzke, Frank & Vance, Colin, 2021. "An increasing gasoline price elasticity in the United States?," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(C).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Gasoline prices; Supply disruption; Colonial Pipeline;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • H12 - Public Economics - - Structure and Scope of Government - - - Crisis Management
    • Q41 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Energy - - - Demand and Supply; Prices
    • Q48 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Energy - - - Government Policy

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:ecolet:v:209:y:2021:i:c:s0165176521003992. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/ecolet .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.