Section 8March 28, 1996, Sec./Art. 8

Monitoring. - The DOE shall monitor and publish daily international oil prices to enable the public to determine whether current market oil prices are reasonable. It shall likewise monitor the quality of petroleum products and stop the operation of businesses involved in the sale of petroleum products which do not comply with the national standards of quality. The Bureau of Product Standards (BPS), in coordination with DOE, shall set national standards of quality that are aligned with the international standards/protocols of quality.

The DOE shall monitor the refining and manufacturing processes of local petroleum products to ensure that clean and safe (environment and worker-benign) technologies are applied. This shall also apply to the process of marketing local and imported petroleum products.

The DOE shall maintain a periodic schedule of present and future total industry inventory of petroleum products for the purpose of determining the level of supply. To implement this, the importers, refiners, and markets are hereby required to submit monthly to the DOE their actual and projected importations, local purchases, sales and/or consumption, and inventory on a per crude/product basis.

Any report from any person of an unreasonable rise in the prices of petroleum products shall be immediately acted upon. For this purpose, the creation of a Department of Energy (DOE) - Department of Justice (DOJ) Task Force is hereby mandated to determine the merits of the report and to initiate the necessary actions warranted under the circumstances to prevent cartelization, among others.