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Pastimes : Clown-Free Zone... sorry, no clowns allowed -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lucretius who wrote (99627)	5/4/2001 12:54:00 PM
From: patron_anejo_por_favor	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 436258

More problems in gasoline alley: quote.bloomberg.com 05/04 12:14 Gasoline Rises on Refinery Disruptions, Lagging U.S. Supplies By Mark Shenk New York, May 4 (Bloomberg) -- Gasoline rose for a second day as supply disruptions in the Midwest exacerbated concern that inventories of the fuel, especially the cleaner-burning reformulated blend, will be low this summer. Refineries run by Marathon Ashland Petroleum LLC in St. Paul, Minnesota, and Citgo Petroleum Corp. near St. Louis shut some units unexpectedly this week, and a tainted batch of motor fuel in Milwaukee forced several filling stations to close. Pump prices in the Midwest are above $2 a gallon for a second year. ``We're concerned about any refinery problem right now,'' said Tom Bentz, a broker at BNP Paribas Futures Inc. in New York. ``Supplies of reformulated gasoline are too low,'' Gasoline for June delivery rose as much as 1.69 cents, or 1.6 percent, to $1.088 a gallon on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract has gained about 3 percent this week. The May contract rose to $1.163 a gallon on Monday, its last day of trading. It was the highest price in the 17 years that unleaded gasoline has been traded on the exchange. Futures represent wholesale prices. Crude oil for June delivery was recently down 8 cents at $28.37 a barrel on the Nymex. Prices are up 6 percent this year. Refineries have been raising production in a race to make enough gasoline in the three weeks until the Memorial Day weekend, which starts on May 25. A fluid catalytic cracker with a 70,000-barrel-a-day capacity at the Marathon refinery was the latest in a string of refinery disruptions in recent weeks. A fire at Tosco's refinery at Wood River, Illinois, last Saturday resulted in the shutdown of a 150,000-barrel-a-day unit. Contaminated Gasoline Thirteen of 70 Mobil service stations in the Milwaukee area stopped gasoline sales temporarily after discovering they'd received contaminated fuel, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported late yesterday, citing Exxon Mobil Corp. spokesman Pat McGinn in Chicago. Contaminated gasoline was also sent to stations selling branded gasoline from Citgo, BP Plc's Amoco chain, Marathon's Speedway SuperAmerica retail chain, and U.S. Oil, the paper said. ``This just adds to the tight supply situation because refiners will have to replace it,'' said Phil Flynn, vice president and senior market analyst at Alaron Trading Corp. in Chicago. Reports of shutdowns at refineries run by Tosco in California and Conoco Inc. in the U.K. helped spur a 23 percent rally in gasoline futures during April. Supplies of reformulated gasoline rose 1.6 percent to 39 million barrels last week, the American Petroleum Institute said Tuesday. Still, production of the fuel, which is sold in the nation's biggest cities, fell almost 7 percent. The grade accounts for one-third of U.S. consumption and is specified for delivery against Nymex futures. In London, Brent crude oil for June settlement was recently 7 cents lower at $28 a barrel on the International Petroleum Exchange. The refiners are clearly "red-lining" gasoline production...as a result, expect more accidents and downtime prior to the driving season.