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 The Energy Department announced it has awarded contracts to three companies
-- Shell Trading Co., Sunoco Logistics and BP North America -- for 12.3 million barrels of oil to go into the government's Strategic Petroleum Reserve, beginning in January.
Deliveries are scheduled at a rate of 70,000 barrels a day for six months.
Some Democrats in Congress have repeatedly criticized the federal purchase of oil for the reserve, diverting it from commercial markets, when supplies are tight and prices increasing.
Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., accused President Bush of "wheeling and dealing with oil companies while American consumers are reeling from dealing with $3 gas and heating oil."
Markey said the president should indicate a willingness to release some of the emergency oil stocks to "curb excessive speculation" that has caused oil prices to edge toward $100 a barrel in recent days.
Bodman rejected suggestions that oil should be released from the oil reserve or from an emergency stockpile of heating oil in an attempt to ease prices.
When asked about the oil contracts after a speech to an energy forum, Bodman said the amount of oil going into the reserve is so modest
-- about one-10th of 1 percent of global supplies -- that it won't have any appreciable impact on prices.
"It's a very modest level when compared to even the amount of oil we use in this country. It does not materially affect the price of oil," he said. "We plan to continue filling the reserve by a modest rate."
Bodman said the administration is concerned about soaring oil prices and that he has been "in regular touch" with foreign oil ministers including those in OPEC to urge more production.
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 "I certainly have made my views known," said Bodman, alluding to his discussions with OPEC and other foreign oil officials. "I am hopeful that we will see a response from them. Whether they respond or choose to respond is up to them and not up to me. I'm doing the best I can within the limited sets of options that we have."
Bodman said that a shortage of supply may be responsible in part for the run-up of oil prices that in recent days has seen markets flirt with the $100-a-barrel mark.
Prices receded somewhat Thursday with light, sweet crude for December delivery falling slightly to just over $95 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Crude prices moved above $98 a barrel earlier in the week.
OPEC's reluctance to pump more crude and the weak U.S. dollar have been cited by analysts as among the reasons for the price surge. Last month, OPEC ministers agreed to boost production by 500,000 barrels a day beginning this month, but that seemed to have little impact on prices.
"We're very concerned (about oil prices) because ... it's like an unplanned tax increase on American families," said Bodman.
The Strategic Petroleum Reserve, a system of salt caverns along the Louisiana and Texas coast, contains 694 million barrels of oil to be used in a supply emergency. The government is working to fill it to its 727 million barrel capacity.
The companies are providing the oil in lieu of royalty payments.
Bodman spoke at an energy conference sponsored by The Washington Post and Areva Group, the French reactor manufacturer.
[Associated Press;
By H. JOSEF HEBERT]
Copyright 2007 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This
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