Washington (Platts)--18Feb2009

US Department of Energy Secretary Steven Chu declined to say whether the
country would ask OPEC to increase oil output at its meeting in March.

"I can't talk about that," he said following a speech to the National
Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners Wednesday in Washington.

OPEC agreed at a meeting in Oran, Algeria, in December to cut production
by 2.2 million b/d from January 1 on top of reductions totalling 2 million b/d
agreed earlier in the year.

The producers' group is due to meet again in Vienna March 15.

Discussing other energy issues, Chu said during his speech that the DOE
will begin issuing loan guarantees for renewable energy as early as April, Chu
said Wednesday.

He said that he does not know why it has taken the DOE several years to
issue the federal loan guarantees, but "our target is start writing checks by
the end of April or the end of May....so three or four months instead of three
or four years," the secretary said.

DOE spokesman Dan Leistikow said that DOE will release more details on
the loan guarantee project Thursday.

In his address to the commissioners, Chu said expanding the country's
electric distribution is a key way to integrate more renewable resources into
the grid.

"We will be relying more on renewable energy," Chu said.

That requires a stronger distribution system, he added.

Chu told reporters after his speech that "electric transmission
distribution is a key part of the economic recovery."