I know most people around here don't care for economics, but it is interesting to know that economically, expensive energy is neither inflationary nor deflationary. Instead, it causes rather complicated changes in the price of items. Generally, everything in the economy has a certain percentage of its costs associated with energy. Some things have a relatively low percentage of their cost being due to energy, like, say, hand-made quilts. Other things have a high percentage due to energy costs, like airline tickets. What will happen when energy increases in price, if the money supply stays roughly constant, is that high-energy-percentage items will get more expensive, while low-energy-percentage items get less expensive. Items that use exactly the average amount of energy as a percentage of costs will not change in price.

It's not always obvious to the non-expert which items use more or less energy than average to make. But this is what will determine whether the prices for those items rise or fall.

This is why we see these contrasting analyses, some predicting inflation and some predicting deflation. It depends on which kinds of goods and services the analyst is focusing on.