Energy Secretary Mulls Fuel Prices Wednesday January 26, 2000

WASHINGTON (AP) - While concerned about oil prices, Energy Secretary Bill Richardson says the government's emergency reserves should not be used to influence the market, and he has no intention to make such oil available.

But Richardson in a wide-ranging interview with The Associated Press, said he is meeting with a number of oil ministers from leading producing nations in the weeks ahead to discuss the high prices in hopes of persuading them to expand production.

Seeing oil prices dip below $12 a barrel a year ago, the producers belonging to the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries last March agreed to reduce production by 4.3 million barrels a day. The limits have stuck and current oil prices are nudging toward $30 a barrel.

Richardson said he plans to meet separately with the oil ministers of Saudi Arabia, Mexico and Venezuela, and possibly other countries. The OPEC nations are scheduled to meet in March to decide whether to continue production limits.

Meanwhile, the White House put in motion plans to increase federal assistance to help low-income families pay for their heating oil, which over the past week has soared in price. The Northeast, especially New England, is particularly affected because of the region's heavy reliance on oil for heating.

The additional funds ``will help keep more families safe and warm this winter,'' President Clinton said, announcing that he was directing the Department of Health and Human Services to make the money available ``just as quickly as we possibly can.''

He said the amount of additional money was still not certain. The move came as a blizzard moved through the Northeast and a week before the critical presidential primary in New Hampshire, where heating oil prices are of considerable importance.

In his interview with The AP, Richardson touched on a number of topics, including his future political aspirations, the changing electricity industry and improved security at nuclear weapons research labs.

On oil prices, he said the administration was concerned, but that ``the market should dictate prices'' and not ``any manipulative mechanisms.'' He said he would not direct oil to be withdrawn from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve in an attempt to influence prices.

``Those (stocks) are used for emergencies,'' he insisted. The reserve, which holds about 560 million barrels of oil, or enough to replace 62 days of imports, was created to counter interruptions in oil supplies.

-- Risteard Mac Thomais (uachtaran@ireland.com), January 26, 2000