North Eastern US experiencing Kerosene shortage due to non-deliveries to NYC major distribution center. Have not received any Kero shipments for 1 1/2 days, have a 3 to 4 day supply at any one time. Local dealers are going to 'scheduled customer only' basis. Scrambling to find supplies, but no one is willing to sell any they have at any price. Portland, Maine delaer says they will run out this Sunday and not be able to deliver to 20 customers. If it goes to monday then 40 more customers, etc You get the picture.

And no polly trolling on this. We are hitting -20 F these nights with another artic blast due for the weekend. Any @sshole who doesn't understand that this could kill people has a large part of his/her cranium up his/her rectum.

Enough said.

-- ..- (dit@dot.dash), January 20, 2000

Answers

The measure of how long it takes for heat to come off will be a good indicator of any lingering Y2K refining impacts. Right now the ARB to the harbor must be nutz. Any refinery with spare capacity is figuring a way to get in on the fun what with Sun announcing they'd be down for two weeks. Hell I heard Jet cargos were being diverted from the west coast.

However, if the crisis lingers, it would be another sign that all is truly not well in USA refinery land. The fact that Sun's been hiding this for a few days bothers me quite a bit. Now I know they needed to cover their requirements, but I think it's a little shady to hide it for 2-3 days.

Anyway you folks take care in the N. East. Stay warm. Boats are on the way.

-- Gordon (g_gecko_69@hotmail.com), January 20, 2000.

Scrambling to find supplies, but no one is willing to sell any they have at any price.

Here is some insight. There is kero available, but the bulk distributors won't open the spigots. Dogs.

Well, I'll chip in my 28 gallons of clear K-1 and 24 gallons of Clear-Lite. Who can organize?

-- Harbor Guy (HarborGuy@OnThe.Waterfront), January 20, 2000.

dit speaks the truth

OPIS ALERT 2000-01-20 14:30:44 EST ***NORTHEASTERN SUPPLY SITUATION GROWS MORE DESPERATE; SPIKE CONTINUES Buyers of heating oil and kerosene are desperately looking for product that can replenish downstream supplies, and prices are soaring to numbers which are 30-40cts gal above where they were when Year 2000 began.

[SNIP]

Kerosene is in desperate supply, with terminals such as Portland Maine totally out of the fuel, which still is the fuel of choice for much of that state. Spot kerosene is quoted at 34cts gal over the NYMEX, this afternoon, putting the theoretical price at nearly $1.20 gal. Jet fuel is just a few cents behind this number and bbls are tough to find. Heating oil has swelled to premiums over the NYMEX that haven't been seen since December 1989. At 2:30 P.M. EST, prompt heating oil (for immediate delivery) was worth 16ts gal over the NYMEX or $1.00 gal. Diesel fuel is trading for about 0.5cts gal less, but much of the diesel available is destined to go to the heating fuel market where it is desperately needed over the next week or ten days. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A later alert tells of dealers adding red dye to on-road diesel so that they can sell it as heating oil.

-- (4@5.6), January 20, 2000.

Pardon me all, but Downstreamer just posted the Bloomberg list of "downed" refineries at his site. Motiva is back up, Coastal is back up, in fact, the refinery problem is not what we all thought.

Believe me, the juice is flying out of the pipes at the waterfront facilities around New York Harbor: TOSCO/Bayway, Hess, Exxon-Mobil, Texaco, BP Amoco, Coastal, Chevron, Shell.

There is no shortage. There is manipulation. Period.

-- Harbor Guy (HarborGuy@OnThe.Waterfront), January 20, 2000.

Portland Press Herald Page 1 this morning (1.21), "Kerosene dealers find the fuel almost impossible to get." (http://www.portland.com/news/shortage0121.shtml) Oddly enough, they're blaming it on the weird weather we've had here in Northern New England -- too warm early in the winter, so all the kerosene was diverted to Europe, (?) which was having a colder-then-normal winter. Now we're in the deep freeze and ships are heading westbound again, but it'll be Feb 4 before any land and start product flowing. Also blamed are "operational problems at two major oil refineries and a lack of reserves." Kero popped 25 cents a gallon in one day in southern Maine Thursday, and that was after rising to an average of $1.32 a gallon last week. Unprecedented. Dealers are sending trucks to Boston for kerosene and are being rationed to 2,000 gallons a day.

Kerosene is the primary heating fuel for about 8 percent of the homes in Maine, especially mobile homes which often aren't allowed to have woodstoves under local zoning laws. (the d*** things are death traps in a fire.) The executive director of the Maine Oil Dealers Association says, "No one is going to freeze to death." But then this is the same guy who last November swore that fuel oil wouldn't break 95 cents a gallon this year. It's now $1.11 on average in Maine.

On another bright note, the US trade deficit in November hit a new high, the latest in a two-year string of new highs.

-- Cash (cash@andcarry.com), January 21, 2000.

Thanks for posting that Cash. Just saw it this AM and was thinking about posting it. Anyone interested in seeing roster of Petro-chem plant/pipe problems see post about 30 above this one. Has URL for list and Petro chat board.

Cash, Thanks for the enumeration of the users. I'm sure 'what's his name' the State guy probably doesn't live in a trailer, eh??? What a jerk. Typical .gov PR mouth.

-- ..- (dit@dot.dash), January 21, 2000.

Make that 29 posts above this one. And there are plenty of people who run Kero Monitors to heat their homes too. In our neighborhood about 5. Also people use them as supplimental heat in apartments where the heating is controlled by the landlord and set for the minimum allowed by State law.

-- ..- (dit@dot.dash), January 21, 2000.

Yup we live in Maine. Yup we heat with kero. Yup the price has gone up. Yup they say it is in shot supply. We be in the mountains. Gonna have a wind chill of about 45 below tomorrow. This could get interesting to say the least. Half of the town uses monitor heaters (needs kero to heat with) also we have a portable kero heater to suppliment the one on the wall. If the supply doesn't get better soon then we are indeed in deep doo doo here. Will keep you posted.

-- jules (jules@fridgid.net), January 21, 2000.

Tell me Jules that you don't REALLY LIVE IN THE MTNS OF MAINE and you have no wood stove or wood to burn?????????? I can hardly believe you would heat with kero to begin with. Even if you live in a little town, there is wood available cheaper than kero. Not really flaming you, just very puzzled. Taz

-- Taz (Tassi123@aol.com), January 21, 2000.

another maine report....just paid $1.79.9 a gal. here mid maine for diesel.....40 cent jump this week.....no K-1 available on the retail basis .....corner store will get 100 gal next week.....glad to have lots of # 2 for the gennie and furnace.....lots of cord wood to fall back on.....might have to burn #2 in the truck.....how many nicks so far.....duppy

-- duppy (duppyi5446@aol.com), January 21, 2000.

Taz: As I mentioned in my post, lots of Maine towns ban woodstoves in mobile homes, for good reason. Also, woodstoves in maine aren't as common anymore as you might think. Lots of people use their stoves as plant stands these days because oil/kero has been so cheap. Anytime oil is under a dollar a gallon, it's actually cheaper to use it than wood, and much less messy and time consuming. Others simply don't have them at all, especially those who have bought homes since the last energy crisis. Anyone in a bind, I suggest Uncle Henry's (it's sort of a magazine full of classified ads) as a good source of used wood stoves.

-- Cash (cash@andcarry.com), January 21, 2000.