Asheville to lead goal of averting another gas crisis

ASHEVILLE

This time last year, hurricanes shut down fuel flow from the Gulf of Mexico, raising gas prices to more than $4 a gallon and causing the worst shortage in the Southeast since the 1970s.

The biggest problem was that the region gets almost all its fuel from the Colonial Pipeline, whose closest terminal is in Spartanburg, S.C., and from which gas must be trucked to the mountains.