Brought

Chevron announced it has filed a petition asking the U.S.Supreme Court to hear a $742 million breach-of-contract case firstbrought upon Gulf Oil Co. in 1982 by Cities Service Co., which wasbought by Occidental in 1984. Dawn Soper, a Chevron spokesperson,said it is now up to the court to rule on the petition.

Yesterday’s Western Gulf of Mexico Lease Sale 174 brought inonly about one-sixth the amount of high bids the previous westernGulf sale garnered last year; however, a spokeswoman for oneindustry group downplayed the lackluster results.

ANR Pipeline brought in a big gun this week to mow down theopposition to its proposed Wisconsin expansion project. It hiredformer Wisconsin Public Service Commission Chairman CharlesCicchetti, now a consultant with the Pacific Economics Group and abusiness professor at the University of Southern California, totout its project over others, particularly the competing GuardianPipeline.

The majority of the oil and gas industry – 94% – report theircomputer systems will be ready by Sept. 30th to deal with anyglitches that may be brought about by the change to a newmillennium, according to the latest survey conducted by the NaturalGas Council and the American Petroleum Institute (API). The entireindustry expects to be Y2K ready by the end of December.

Mitchell Energy & Development agreed to settle the lastremaining 25 North Texas groundwater lawsuits brought against acompany subsidiary. Plaintiffs alleged in the suits that Mitchell’soil and gas operations in Wise County, TX, affected theirgroundwater.