California’s fuel watchdog has issued subpoenas to gasoline stations across the state that are charging anomalously high prices and not cooperating with agency requests.

The Division of Petroleum Market Oversight, an independent agency within the California Energy Commission, said in March it was keeping a close watch on potential price gouging as the Iran war spiked fuel costs across the globe. DPMO said it was engaging with retailers whose “high prices may not be justified by increases in their input costs,” the agency said in a public notice.

Some stations are cooperating but other aren’t, prompting subpoenas from the agency, DPMO Director Tai Milder said in a meeting of the California State Assembly’s Utilities and Energy Committee on Tuesday.

“We were concerned that some retailers might use the conflict as a pretext to inflate their retail prices,” Milder said during the meeting. “And we saw something similar happen after the Ukraine invasion.”

Although Milder declined to name the station owners who’ve been subpoenaed, he said those charging unusually high prices were all major brands rather than unbranded or regional retailers. Pump prices at some of the stations dropped by 50 cents-a-gallon or more after being contacted by the agency, Milder added.

A gallon of unleaded gasoline in California costs on average just over $6, almost $2 above the national average.

(With assistance from Andrew Oxford.)

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