It looks like we’ll all have to get used to walking a lot more often.

The price of gas has been raised yet again as the price of oil increased to a record-high $74 a barrel at one point Wednesday, according to Thursday’s Northern Star article. Gas prices around DeKalb are hovering around $3 a gallon.

Economics professor Khan Mohabbat said tensions in the Middle East and a decrease in the world’s oil supply could be driving oil prices up.

Other factors include increasing demand for gasoline, hurricane-ruined refineries, and unimplemented changes that would require less sulfur emissions in gas, said Jonathan Cogan, energy information specialist for the Energy Information Administration.

What’s more is that many experts expect these increases to continue as the summer nears.

“The bad news is the numbers are going to keep going up. We expect that gasoline over the next few weeks could go, on average, to $3.10, $3.20 a gallon,” said Carol Thorpe, spokeswoman for the American Automobile Association in Thursday’s article on the National Public Radio Web site.

More troubling than the thought of having to pawn personal possessions to fill the tank is the instability in oil prices.

One has to wonder how long it will be and how bad things will become before government officials make substantial efforts to find alternative fuel sources.

The problem is the government will have to invest billions of dollars to build the infrastructure necessary to make using alternatives fuels like ethanol practical, Mohabbat said.

That is something many government officials aren’t willing to do just yet.

Although it is a large investment, it is a much better alternative to sitting and waiting to see how high gas prices will become.

And you’ll get to keep your stuff.