http://biz.yahoo.com/rf/981209/bna.html

ednesday December 9, 9:51 pm Eastern Time

Chevron denies problems at Calif. refineries

LOS ANGELES, Dec 9 (Reuters) - Chevron Corp (NYSE:CHV - news) on Wednesday denied rumours that either of its large California refineries had been hit by production problems, despite rumours that gasoline output was hampered in recent days.

``We don't have any issues here,'' said a spokesman for Chevron's El Segundo, California, refinery near Los Angeles. ``The facility's running well,'' he added.

A spokesman for Chevron's San Francisco area refinery declined comment on the rumours.

Spot prices for U.S. West Coast cleaner-burning gasoline (CARB) rose about 1.50 cents a gallon on Wednesday to 41/42 cents a gallon in response to the market talk. Traders said Chevron was a big buyer of gasoline in the past two days.

``It has certainly put them in the market for a lot of gasoline,'' one West Coast dealer said.

``Something's down,'' another said. ``A unit's down that affects production of gas and jet fuel,'' he said.

I wonder if this is Y2K related.

-- Mike Lang (webflier@erols.com), December 09, 1998

Answers

Mike:

Take a deep breath, reach up and re-tune the tab on the right side of your glases to "Skeptic" from "Y2K". NOT every downing of a facility is Y2 related. Lets use our giant salt licks for much of this. (Unless it happens to be the straw that moves a DGI to a GI!!)

Chuck

-- Chuck a night driver (rienzoo@en.com), December 09, 1998.