Energy Agency Sets Up Web Page for Gas Gripes

Californians are really angry about the price of gasoline.

Really, really angry.

So angry, in fact, that they’re scorching a toll-free telephone line, (800) CEC-4685, originally set up by the California Energy Commission to handle questions about energy efficiency.

So many motorists have jammed the line--more than 1,200 a day--that the energy policy and planning agency last week created a special place on its Web site for consumers to pump their ire: https://www.energy.ca.gov/gasoline.

In its first six days of cyber-life, the gasoline complaint page recorded more than 9,500 gripes, said Claudia Chandler, the energy commission’s assistant director.

“Half the people who are responding are just annoyed that gasoline prices are this high,” Chandler said.

Most of the rest, she said, are responding to a much-forwarded anonymous e-mail message that has been whipping around the Internet in the last month, urging recipients to contact the commission as a way to urge Gov. Gray Davis to allow the state’s gasoline stations to sell fuel produced by refineries outside California.

The California Air Resources Board requires that gasoline in the state meet strict air-quality standards, and most refineries outside California do not make this cleaner-burning gasoline. But even if retailers were allowed to sell conventional gasoline, it would have to be imported via large oil tankers because no pipelines currently bring petroleum products into California, Chandler said.