The cost of filling up the car is rising in the wake of soaring crude and by this weekend, pump prices may race past the highs for all of 2009.

Tracing the ascension of crude, up 14 percent since mid-December, energy prices across the board are catching up.

It's part economic and part meteorologic.

Look at what happened just on Monday:

• Crude prices closed at $81.51 a barrel, the highest settlement price on the New York Mercantile Exchange since Oct. 9, 2008.

• Heating oil futures settled at $2.1905, well beyond the highest prices of 2009

• Gasoline futures hit $2.1044, the highest closing since Oct. 3, 2008.

By the weekend a gallon of gas will hit $2.70, higher than the peak for 2009, and will be pushing $3 by spring, predicted Tom Kloza of the Oil Price Information Service.

One of the breaks consumers got in 2009 was cheap energy. It's too soon to tell if the rising prices are setting the trend for 2010, though Peter Beutel of Cameron Hanover called sharply higher heating oil prices an "ominous sign for the year ahead."