For a change, a gasoline price spike looked politically easy-but only next to the evacuation of close to a million Gulf Coast residents following Hurricane Katrina’s visit. Politicians and bureaucrats nevertheless adopted postures calculated to suggest they were vigilantly watching out for the consumer as they tried to determine what problems the storm revealed and how to solve them.
Twenty-one members of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee urged the Federal Trade Commission on Sept. 12 to heighten its scrutiny of gasoline prices.
They noted that a section of the 2005 energy law mandated that the FTC investigate to determine the extent of any gasoline market manipulation or price gouging and present a report to Congress by Nov. 6. “In light of the heightened awareness of the issue of high gasoline prices, it would be useful if the FTC could issue interim reports of its findings, as appropriate, to help maintain awareness of the heightened scrutiny that is taking place and to assure the public that any improper behavior will be uncovered and dealt with quickly,” the committee members said.
Already at work
The FTC shouldn’t have trouble complying with the request. In May 2002, it began to monitor retail gasoline prices in some 360 cities nationwide and terminal rack prices in 20 urban areas. Its Bureau of Economics staff receives daily data from Oil Price Information Service and weekly information from the Department of Energy’s public gasoline hotline. Within the Bush administration, meanwhile, three Cabinet members flew to the Gulf Coast Sept. 13 to evaluate their departments’ responses to the storm. Interior Sec. Gale A. Norton and Energy Sec. Samuel W. Bodman visited the Strategic Petroleum Reserve at Bayou Choctaw in Plaquemine, La. They then joined Transportation Sec. Norman Y. Mineta at the Plantation Pipeline in Collins, Miss. Pipeline service restoration was one of Mineta’s top priorities. He previously dispatched Brigham McCown, acting and deputy administrator of the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, and other Transportation officials to the Gulf Coast to also help design and implement emergency fuel distribution networks for the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
‘Running normally’
On Sept. 7, Mineta declared that all pipelines in the Southeast, Midwest, and Atlantic states were running normally and added, “That includes the two largest pipelines serving the East Coast, Colonial and Plantation.”
In the Interior Department, the Minerals Management Service’s Gulf of Mexico staff completed a temporary move to Houston under its Continuity of Operations Plan. District and subdistrict offices in Lafayette, Houma, and Lake Charles, La., and in Lake Jackson, Tex., continued to operate, with inspections handled through the Lafayette district office.
Gulf of Mexico production continued to recover. By Sept. 13, 846,720 b/d of oil, or 56.45% of normal production, and 3.72 bcfd of gas, or 37.2% of normal production, remained shut-in. ✦