Primers on the Energy Crisis of 2008

The price of crude oil has doubled over the past year, from $65 for a barrel in June 2007 to $130 a barrel now. With no end in sight, CNN and Fortune have recently published special reports on this energy "crisis."

Fortune's Gallery of Oil Villains: What or who is to blame for soaring energy prices: big oil companies, foreign oil producers, supply and demand, sharp decline in the value of the dollar, manipulators of the oil futures market, speculators in commodity index funds. Check out Fortune's scoreboard.

CNN's Fueling America: This special report includes a number of articles including Oil Prices 101:  What Factors Influence the Price of Crude Oil and interactive resources, such as maps for The World's Top Consumers and Producers of Oil and Average Gas Prices Across the Country. Check out CNN's Fueling America.

While the price at the pump is nearing $4.00 a gallon in the US, it's $8.00 a gallon across much of Europe.

More on the impact of rising oil prices from today's edition of the New York Times: Oil Prices Raise Cost of Making Range of Goods [JH]