The Hill published an essay by Rep. Colleen Hanabusa about how to curb climbing gas prices. Hanabusa says that tensions in the Middle East are again affecting what drivers pay at the pump. 

“With one fifth of the world’s oil supply transiting the Strait of Hormuz — a flow of roughly 17 million barrels a day — Iranian threats to blockade the Strait, along with fears of the effects of an Israeli attack on Iran, are leading to efforts to stockpile crude, driving up prices,” Hanabusa wrote. 

She said the United States must “disengage” from its “increasingly fragile” relationships with petroleum as the country’s primary energy source. To do that, the country will have to go “beyond the next gas pump” and address fundamental energy policy, she said. 

Read the complete essay.