http://www.jrnl.com/news/99/May/jrn29250599.html

Report blasts oil companies for lack of Y2K preparedness

By JIM ABRAMS Associated Press

WASHINGTON - The oil and gas industry, with its dependence on computers, has too many question marks about its plans to deal with Year 2000 computer problems, a congressional report concludes.

The General Accounting Office, the investigative arm of Congress, said while individual companies are confronting possible problems, no national-level approach has emerged to deal with shortages or disruptions in the nation's oil and gas supplies.

``The oil and gas industry is highly automated, and the task to remediate all critical systems is enormous,'' said Sen. Robert Bennett, R-Utah, who requested the report and who chairs a special Senate panel on the Y2K problem with vice chairman Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn. ``It appears they started too late.''

Citing an industry survey taken in February, the GAO said more than a quarter of the industry does not expect to be Y2K ready until the second half of 1999, ``leaving little time for resolving unexpected problems.''

American Petroleum Institute spokesman Juan Palomo said the industry has taken extensive steps to fix computers and prepare for contingencies. He said it has long experience in dealing with natural disasters and other crises and has backups for every system.

``We are very confident that we will do everything that needs to be done to continue the flow of oil to American consumers,'' he said.

The report also noted that more than half of U.S. oil is imported, which leaves the country vulnerable to production and transportation problems in other countries that have done less to prepare for the possibility that some computers will read 2000 as 1900.

The report said if the flow of foreign oil imports is interrupted, oil can be supplied by the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which now holds nearly 600 million barrels of oil.

The reserve can supply about 3.9 million barrels a day for 90 days, three-eighths of daily imports.

Also yesterday, the National Federation of Independent Business and Wells Fargo released results of a survey that found 59 percent of small businesses that might encounter Y2K problems have acted to prevent disruption.

The survey of 500 small business owners, conducted in April by the Gallup Organization, also found that 54 percent of those responding had verified their suppliers and financial institutions are preparing for Y2K.

The survey was the third taken in the past year by the NFIB, which represents small businesses. In April 1998, only 23 percent of at-risk small firms had taken action. Last October the figure was up to 40 percent. The margin of error for the survey was plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

``We have seen a large jump in awareness of the problem over the last six months,'' said William Dennis, who authored the study for the NFIB Education Foundation.

-- Arlin H. Adams (ahadams@ix.netcom.com), May 25, 1999

Answers

Help those of us who were in kindergarten during the '73 oil crunch: at that point, was it 5% of imported petro supply that was cut?

"The reserve can supply about 3.9 million barrels a day for 90 days, three-eighths of daily imports."

Also, I'd like price-gouging defined. If the US SPR has to part with that crude, can they sell to the highest bidder? (bear in mind that our tax dollars are filling up this SPR.)

-- lisa (lisa@work.now), May 25, 1999.

We're really set up for this one. Stretched so thin in Kosovo, Saddam is probably celebrating now for his pounce to come in 2000. We'll be strapped here at home and abroad. Now .....what has he been hiding??? I bet we'll find out. karen

-- karen (karen@karen.karen), May 26, 1999.

So the GAO is citing some unnamed survey. Who funded that survey?

I thought we'd decided that survey results were of dubious value. Or did we decide that survey results we agreed with were gospel, and the *rest* were garbage? I forget.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), May 26, 1999.