I recently heard through a VERY reliable first hand source that many N. East utilities are planning to take extra deliveries on fuel oil for year end. To a tee they are planning an extra, pipe, barge whatever.

I want to know what you've heard about your utility and what they're plans are for extra fuel. Also, any plans you have personally for stockpiling heating oil or diesel for year end?

Thanks in advance

-- Anonymous, October 05, 1999

Answers

Gordon,

I will only have a few 5 gallon cans of gas. I have that amount for lawns in summer here normally. Too dangerous to store alot more in my humble opinion. My family and I are into biking anyway so if we have gas shortages we will be ok (except for the possibility of ambush as I do live within 5 miles of a 7-11)

I have plenty of Coleman fuel and propane to last until the food runs out anyway and starvation sets in.

For warmth? We had tremendous fires last year here so there is literally tons of seasoned firewood throughout the area. Not that it gets dangerously cold in Florida but it can get rather chilly. Actually, along the lines of your survey, I am personally more concerned about next summer. Air conditioning!!!

I haven't heard if FP&L is planning on or is buying extra fuel but I wouldn't put it past them. I maintain that FPL, although they should have fixed this deal 20 years ago, is a great utility and if they see the need for that type of contingency planning I am sure they are acting on it.

By the way and OT: When I am chopping wood, I lay the ax into a piece of oak and say... thank you FPL for being there, I hit the piece of oak again and say.... geez my utility bill isn't that bad after all and so and so.

-- Anonymous, October 06, 1999

Gordon,

All my electricity distribution company are prepared to do is to raise all stores items to the 'max-stock' level. This comes at a considerable cost of course. Under normal circumstances there never would be a moment in time when every single line item would be at it's upper limit of stockholding.

Kind regards..James

-- Anonymous, October 06, 1999

Gordon, my electricity provider, Niagara Mohawk, has recently sold off most of its generating plants. As NiMo says in its most recent 10Q, "..Niagara Mohawk expects that by the year 2000, it will be purchasing the majority of its electric generation needs." So they did not need to address any extra fuel storage as a part of their Y2K contingency plans. In fact, a good deal of their Y2K "Risk" statements to the SEC have changed in the direction of "dependency on third party providers" over the last year, both in the electric and natural gas portions of their business.

On the personal side, we are not storing gas or diesel, having made the decision last year not to go in the direction of getting a generator, and because we felt it was safer and more practical for us to have our fuel stores be wood and propane. The New York/Canadian ice storm proved to many of us in this cold northern area the great value of a wood stove and I wouldn't be without my "Blue Betsy", as I affectionately call it, Y2K or no.

I do know that some of the farmers in my area have gotten extra diesel tanks, though. This is to run their tractor-generating systems, since they must have electricity to milk cows, which can no longer be done by hand because of the size of herds and the fact that the cows are too used to milking machines and don't tolerate hand milking at all well. (Ever been kicked by an irritated cow?) This move on their part is both Y2K and ice storm related, since some farmers lost everything during the weeks of the ice storm because it went on longer than their fuel supplies for generators lasted. That's the only increase in diesel stockpiles I personally know about.

-- Anonymous, October 06, 1999

Dear Gorden,

Comm Ed is quietly selling out and leaving town before Y2k ;) - as far as I know, there have been no plans for stockpiling and for most of the Comm Ed plants it would mean extra coal supplies. From the reports I've read - it's nearly impossible to stock pile extra coal because the mines are working at full capacity as it is.

As for our personal preparation, we bought a wood stove and are having it installed next week - yeah, I can hardly wait. Because we are rural, LP is our normal heating fuel. I'm going to make sure our 500 gallon tank is filled before mid-December. We are also storing kerosine - for our lamps and our kerosine heater.

We'll have a little gasoline in case we have to crank up the generator, but all of the plans we've made are geared to make us as independent from the use of electricity as possible.

Terri

-- Anonymous, October 06, 1999

I have heard the power plants in the Houston area are stockpiling. (Even scarier is what the National Guard in packing in, according to a couple of well placed "weekenders"). But I thought it was significant that a small local propane service center is no longer offering kerosene. He says the tank is emply and there isn't enough demand to warrant re-filling it. We are in the 'burbs about 30 miles north of Houston....a very high dollar neck-o'-tha-woods.

-- Anonymous, October 07, 1999

Hilco, our supplier of electricty, is a rural co-op and does not generate - distributes only; and buys from five different sources. We live in a rural area and we use propane to heat our home and our water. We have purchased 1,000 gallons of propane. We have also purchased 350 gals. of diesel (tractor and truck use diesel) and 275 gals. of gasoline (company provides overhead, gravity flow tanks for diesel and gasoline. We have aslo installed solar panels and wind generators to provide electricity.

Our major problem is water. Our water co-op has no contingency plans. If we have no electricty, we have no water. We have purchased storage tanks for 1,700 gals. of water and have downspouts for collecting rainwater but this year we haven't had much rain. I worry about next summer and air conditioning. We live in Texas and it gets "hot as Hades" in the summer.

-- Anonymous, October 07, 1999

Dear Gordon..we live in north central Florida. We have our own well and recently had a second well drilled with a deep well hand pump put on it. we have a 40kw generator and 2000 gal of off road diesel for it and the tractor. We have 500 gasoline and 500 regular diesel. We will run two families from the generator several times per week in order to keep the freezers frozen, shower, do laundry, etc. We are on a rural co op that buys from several power producers. Our co op has a generator for their office and has been installing large gens for businesses. Its my understanding that Florida gets almost 100% of its gasoline and its oil from Venezuela. I don't know if that is gospel or not. But if so, I would think Florida Power and Light would be stock piling.

Taz

-- Anonymous, October 07, 1999

Hi Gordon, We have a small farm, so we're storing 600 gallons of gas for the tractor, converted to LP from natural gas, and have installed a wood stove with a lot of wood. We'll refill the LP tank in early December. I don't know exactly where Consumer's Energy is--requesting Y2K info from them leads to a form letter with non-specific answers and the message "We're optimistic that we'll be providing power to our customers..."

-- Anonymous, October 08, 1999

Gordon, Been gone a few days. We have a co-op, they buy from a company that buys from three companies, one coal, one nuke, one hydro. I don't expect to have electricity. We have 500 gal. propane tank to run only propane freezer. Have 4 barrels kerosene for heaters and for two lanterns to use outside if needed. Have gallons upon gallons of lamp oil for Aladdin lamps and cheap oil lamps, have Texas size barbecue cooker with hundreds of lbs. of charcoal (it also burns wood), have propane camp stove with 5 20lb. propane tanks, have many cans Safe Heat for warming food. Enough candles to go a year on just candle light. Water, no problem. Will have stored 1,500 gal., have new childrens' pools to put out to catch rain water, last choice is an entire huge lake 25 yds. from front door, several Katadyn filters. Oh, yes, we have a fire place made to heat room instead of sucking hot air out of house, plus we live in a huge forest and have hydraulic log splitter and will store some 5 gal. containers of gasoline just for the chain saw. Large gasoline storage is not for us.

-- Anonymous, October 10, 1999

Well from far far away, Scandinavia to be imprecise, this report in the Danish magasine, Computerworld (translation follows): Original article, in Danish at Er 2000:Statoil fylder olielagrene

Very rough translation:

Norwegian oil company Statoil is filling up its oil storage tanks in Kalundborg (trans: Denmark west coast). Even though they have carried out comprehensive year 2000 tests on their oil platforms, the company does not feel 100 percent secure that a production stoppage will not occur.

-- We have tested all our fields. Where we have discovered problems, we have corrected them. But we can not be 100 percent sure. Therefore we are are storing at our refineries in Kalundborg, says information chief in Statoil Hans Aasmund Frisak --

He was unable to say how much extra oil will be stored in Kalundborg, but says that there will be sufficient to deal with any problems in the days following the year end changeover.

-- If something goes wrong, and we cannot get oil to shore, we know we have enough oil available for a couple of days. That's how long it will take to solve the problems, he says --

-- Anonymous, October 12, 1999

Our prep's (based on the no one knows for sure what will happen theory) include a coal furnace in our house, coal furnace in my husband's hobby shop, 500 gallons of propane, inverter, two generators, batteries, lots of coal, indoor wood stove for cooking and the wood to go with it. We also have a deep well. We only just got town water a few years back, and we didn't fill our well in. We can switch from town water to well water with the turn of a lever. Since several others have made prep's in my village, we can easily take care of everyone if the lights go out. It is very cold in the winter were I live (Saskatchewan), and I'm not taking any chances. And to tell you the truth, I'm starting to feel a whole lot better about things, but I'm glad I've completed my prep's, just in case! If they are not needed, great! If we do experience any degree of disruptions, I'm prepared for the winter. Also, I believe in sharing resources. My major concern is the fact that even IF a short-term power outage occurs (in the case of Y2K) people will panic. However, if they KNOW they have immediate alternatives, panic is eliminated. As far as food goes, we don't have a grocery store in our village as everyone shops in a nearby City, so most people (with the exception of younger families & singles) have their freezers full, pantry stocked etc. every fall. Again, I don't consider myself a "doomer". I'm just one of those folks that don't take chances, and I don't wait until I have clear evidence before I take action. I also believe our society today, including governments and industry is more haphazard than ever - people are getting lazier, tardier, less professional, and more reliant on others in all aspects of life.

-- Anonymous, October 12, 1999