The Waterbury Democrat. [volume] (Waterbury, Conn.) 1917-1946, 1942-04-23

E@S0m toward putting
jurisdiction over
pipelines under the Interstate Com
merce Commission, Of which East
man is chairman. And that Is i'm
portant.
Pipelines for the transmission Of
petroleum products may seem
rather remote from the daily life
of the average citizen, but when
potential pipeline deliveries a:e
translated into gasoline for the
tank of the family automobile or
fuel oil for the oil-burning furnace
-products which are going to be
increasingly scarce because Of
tanker torpedoings along the At
lantic coast-then pipelines be-
come everybody's business and
every mans interest is something
more than academic.
Secretary of Interior 1ckes serves
as petroleum co-ordinator through
the informal authority of a presi-
Dental letter Of last May, telling
the co-ordinator to coordinate all
federal activities concerned with the
production, refining, transportation
and marketing of petroleum, par
ticularly as to national defense.
DREAM UP A SHORTAGE
The co-ordinator's office shortly
thereafter created the first gasoline
shortage, which didn't exist, and
proposed doing things about it. One
of the suggestions was for a a.
inch pipeline to run from the Texas
oil fields to the New York and
Philadelphia refineries. 1t was
turned down by the now defunct
Supply PrioritieS and ALLEGATIONS
Board, which said that the 100000
tons of steel. for the line couldn't
be spared.
Then the gas shortage disap-
peared and no more was heard
about pipelines until German subs
began sinking tankers along the
Atlantic coast, when a real short
age developed. The petroleum CO.
ordinator'S Office called a confer
ence and has recently proposed
that some 1400 miles Of existing
pipelines be dug up and relocated
to relieve the eastern seaboard
shortages.
In the meantime, there has been
kicking around for some months
a proposal for a Pinch and To-
inch common carrier pipeline rum
ming from wichita Falls, Tex, to
Savannah, Ga. The line would
tap the fields Of East Texas, LOU
isiana and Mississippi. One sug-
gestion was that deliveries at Sa-
vannah could be barged up the
intracoastal canal to the eastern
refineries and Norfolk an d
Charlestown Navy Yards, thus keep
ing the water transportation cut
of the ocean shipping lanes whsre
submarines menaced. 1t was e2-
timated that this pipeline would
have required only $4,000 tons Of
steel plate of a thickness that
would not have competed with steel
plate capacity needed for ship con-
struction.
PRICE CONTROL WRECKER
The common carrier phase Of the
project was Of special interest. All
existing U. S. pipelines are privately
owned by the major oil companies
or their subsidiaries. They cannot
carry each others oil, nor the oil
of the independence producers, I'm"
less they buy it. AS common car
rier, the proposed Wichita Falls
Savannah pipeline would have been
forced to haul the oil Of an pro-
Queer It would have been some
thing unique as a public utility TO
help break the major oil purchasing
agencies control Of prices at the
well.
Application to build this line
was made to the once Of Defense
TRANSPORTATION. A three m n
board was named to investigate
and report. The board reported
there was no evidence this was q
defense necessity and Director
Eastman's decision confirmed this
finding. For the time being, there
fore, the wichita Falls Savannah
project is dead.
In Director Eastman's decision,
however, he took occasion to point
out that "under the executive or
der of the president, creating the
once Of Defense Transportation,
I am given a definite responsibility
for domestic transportation, incluo-
ing transportation by pipeline"
Eastman, in other words, can be
interpreted as saying that anything
done about pipelines In this war
should be done by him.