Cold weather and strong demand in the Northeast forced KeySpanEnergy shut-off supplies to 650 interruptible commercial customerson Long Island on Christmas eve.

Spokeswoman Bonnie Habyan said customers were asked to usealternative fuel sources such as home heating oil. She said thatall of the customers complied with the shut-off order except for asmall handful of smaller customers, which posed no threat to theinfrastructure of KeySpan’s system.

Habyan said some of the non-compliant customers could beattributed to mechanical failure, while the rest simply did notmake the switch. Customers who refused to switch can be penalizednine times the current price of natural gas per therm.

To guarantee that the fuel transition ran smoothly, KeySpansurveyed its interruptible customers in mid-November to make surethey had either a 10-day supply of alternative fuel on-hand, orproof of a contract to receive alternative fuel.

Habyan said there was no threat to firm customers. KeySpan plansto hold a meeting Friday to discuss the position of itsinterruptible customers. “They are going to continue to ask them toswitch until Friday morning, at which time they will re-evaluate,”she said.

KeySpan sells gas to 1.5 million firm customers throughout theNew York Metropolitan area.

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