With the territory's heating fuel prices already 15 cents per litre higher than they were a year ago, Yukoners' pocketbooks are going to be hit even harder as prices are set to soar in the wake of hurricane Katrina.

The hurricane, which hit Monday, has left thousands of people dead and tens of thousands missing. It has swamped New Orleans, has halted production of more than 'one million barrels of oil per day' and is going to push record-high oil prices even higher, experts predict.

According to statistics compiled on behalf of the Yukon's Department of Economic Development, the cost of heating fuel in the territory has jumped nearly 15 cents in the past year.

As of Sept. 1, 2004, the price of furnace oil was '74.7 cents per-litre in the territory, a figure that jumped to '90.5 cents per litre' as of Aug. 31.

In contrast, the price of propane dropped nearly 15 cents over the same period.

On Sept. 1, 2004, the price of one litre of propane (one 500-gallon tank) was 74 cents, dropping to 61.4 cents as of Aug. 31.

In an interview with the Star this morning, George Eynon, vice-president of the Canadian Energy Research Institute (CERI), called the situation 'bad.' The event, which is being called the worst natural disaster in American history, will have a significant impact on global fuel prices, he said.

CERI is an independent, non-profit research institute based in Alberta which analyzes energy economics and related environmental policy issues in the production, transportation and consumer sectors in Canada.

'This is going to have a fairly significant impact; there's a whole part of U.S. production off-line,' Eynon said.

'Eight of the 10 refineries are off-line and the importing facility is virtually destroyed.

'Heating oil has already jumped 12 per cent since the hurricane hit and it's only going to get higher; this is bad,' he said.

On Wednesday, the U.S. Secretary of Energy, Samuel Bodman, said Katrina will likely have long-lasting impacts on energy production.

'Looking at the broader impacts on the nation, we are mindful that the affected region contributes a significant amount of our oil, gas and refined product supply,' he said.

According to the U.S. Department of Energy, the event has left many American service stations without gasoline and and knocked out a substantial portion of America's energy supply.

'As of 11:30 Central Time September 1, Gulf of Mexico oil production was reduced by over 1.356 million barrels per day as a result of Hurricane Katrina, equivalent to 90.43 per cent of daily Gulf of Mexico oil production.

'Approximately one million barrels of gasoline (isn't) being produced ... representing 10 per cent of the nation's consumption, and is a major drop in the normal flow of gasoline through the system,' the USDE department reported on its website.

The energy authority reported Kartrina 'will likely have a lasting impact on refinery production and the distribution system (of fuel).'

In response to the crisis, the U.S. government has announced it will release oil from its Stategic Petroleum Reserve in an attempt to ramp up production once the refineries are back on-line.

The reserve is considered 'a national security asset' and consists of 700 million barrels of oil.