GAS

Gas for under $2? Put it down as too good to last. AAA Mid-Atlantic reported Sunday that the average price of a gallon of regular-grade gasoline in Maryland has risen above two bucks after four months below that level. After bottoming out at about $1.70 in January, the Maryland average rose to $2.03 Sunday, according to AAA. Sub-$2 gasoline lingered at some low-cost, mostly rural stations, but most in the Baltimore area appeared to have breached that barrier over the weekend. The consolation is that gas prices remain far below their levels of a year ago, when the Maryland average stood at $3.26.

What do you do if you run out of gas in the middle of the Harbor Tunnel? This was the question posed to me by a Sun colleague, photographer Barbara Haddock-Taylor, who came distressingly close to experiencing that particular public humiliation. Fortunately, she had just enough fumes to make it to a gas station. More generally, what do you do when dismal automotive events occur at the worst possible places? Let us define "worst possible places" as busy traffic bottlenecks where a lack of shoulder space gives any motorist the potential to become a one-person traffic jam -- not to mention a serious hazard to oneself and others.

Several homes and businesses in Northeastern Anne Arundel County were expected to be without natural gas service overnight after a subcontractor for Comcast ruptured a gas line while installing equipment yesterday morning near Sunset Elementary School, an Anne Arundel County Fire Department spokesman said. The rupture in the 8500 block of Fort Smallwood Road did not result in a fire, explosion or injuries, said Lt. Frank Fennell, the spokesman. The school was evacuated, traffic was halted, and more than 200 homes in the nearby Pine Grove Village lost gas service, which Fennell said would be restored house by house through the night or early today.

Halliburton Co., the world's second-largest oilfield services provider, will move Chief Executive Officer David Lesar to a new corporate headquarters in Dubai to help the company expand in the Middle East and Asia. The move is part of an effort to shift business outside North America, which provided 55 percent of Halliburton's profit last quarter, and to court national oil companies that pump most of the oil in the Middle East. The company will keep a corporate office in Houston, where it has its headquarters today, the company said in a statement.

In a deal that could benefit Baltimore's air quality and its bottom line, city officials said yesterday that they will soon capture methane gas from a landfill and sell it to the Coast Guard as a source of energy. The 16,000 tons of methane generated by the Quarantine Road Landfill annually will be pumped to the Coast Guard Yard, which will use the gas to light and heat its 112-acre facility on Hawkins Point Road in Curtis Bay - reducing its reliance on traditional energy sources. Several local governments across the country and in Maryland - including Baltimore and Anne Arundel counties - are looking at ways not only to reuse methane, which is a greenhouse gas, but also to turn what gas they collect into a revenue source.

Three families were forced to leave their homes in the Elkridge area yesterday after Howard County fire officials discovered explosive levels of methane in the houses.The gas readings were so high that a pilot light for a water heater or stove could have caused an explosion in the houses, which are in the 7000 block of Calvert Drive, said Capt. Chris Shimer of Howard County Fire and Rescue Services.The methane was detected after a resident smelled gas and called Baltimore Gas and Electric Co.BGE found readings of potentially explosive levels of methane and called 911 about 3: 15 p.m.About 30 houses were tested for methane and all but three were found safe, Shimer said.

Bill Bambarger, his wife and their three children have spent the past three nights sleeping at his sister's home in Ellicott City."Right now, we don't have any idea how long it'll take before we can move back in," Bambarger, 34, said yesterday of the Elkridge home they purchased three months ago. "I don't think it will be anytime soon."The Bambargers, with two other families living in the 7000 block of Calvert St., were evacuated from their homes Wednesday evening after officials detected high levels of an explosive gas in their basements.

Three families were barred from returning to their $300,000 homes in Elkridge yesterday after officials detected high levels of an explosive gas seeping into their basements."

Residents of Westminster's Autumn Ridge neighborhood spent this weekend thanking divine providence or their lucky stars that Thursday's devasting natural gas explosion didn't kill or injure any one. They thanked the dozens of emergency response volunteers who quickly mobilized to efficiently deal with aftermath of this horrendous accident.An unfortunate collection of circumstances resulted in this disaster. Utility companies have well-publicized programs to prevent contractors from severing buried gas, electric and telephone lines.

The explosion that destroyed a Westminster home and caused more than $1 million in damage Thursday afternoon was ignited by a tiny spark from a basement sump pump, state officials said yesterday.The blast was fueled by natural gas that seeped for 90 minutes from a ruptured 4-inch Baltimore Gas and Electric Co. pipeline into the basement of 90 Sunshine Way, said state Fire Marshal Rocco J. Gabriele.He ruled the 1:18 p.m. explosion at the unoccupied home accidental. There were no injuries.As residents of the Autumn Ridge neighborhood began to cope with the damage -- more than 65 homes in the 12-year-old development were damaged, 20 were deemed uninhabitable by county building inspectors, and four are expected to be torndown -- BGE officials were at a loss to explain why gas flowed through the ruptured line for more than 90 minutes before it was shut off."

Christian Audigier to open store in Towson mall Christian Audigier, which makes the popular Ed Hardy graphic T-shirts, will open a 1,842-square-foot boutique at Towson Town Center Oct. 19. The store will be located in the luxury wing of the mall, a 110,000-square-foot section on the second floor that opened last year and includes high-end stores such as Louis Vuitton, Lacoste, Martin and Osa, Burberry and BCBG Max Azria. Christian Audigier international brands also include SMET, Crystal Rock, C-Bar-A, Savoir Faire, Evel Knievel, Rock Fabulous and Paco Chicano.

The problem:: A persistent gas leak on an Essex street troubles neighbors. The back story:: The tarps draped across the entrances to the Rein family home on North Stuart Street serve more of a practical than decorative purpose. The Reins put up the plastic sheeting to prevent gas fumes leaking from a main on the street from entering their house. Judith Rein and her family had been calling since Aug. 2 to report the smell of gas in the neighborhood. Baltimore Gas & Electric Co. workers arrived several times to measure gas levels, and they replaced some lines to individual houses and some meters, but the gas continued to permeate the Rein house.

The Annapolis Police Department headquarters was evacuated Wednesday and two of its employees remained sick Thursday after a potentially deadly gas was drawn into the building, which is under renovation. Carbon monoxide sickened many people in the building, including the receptionist, who appeared to have been rendered unconscious by the gas, said Maj. Scott Baker of the Annapolis police. Two people, both of whom work near air vents, were treated at Anne Arundel Medical Center and released, but had not returned to work Thursday, Baker said.

Ten people were rushed to a hospital Thursday and treated for symptoms of carbon monoxide poisoning after abnormally high levels of the gas were detected in a Rosedale warehouse. About 60 employees at the two-story, 155,000-square-foot Case Mason packing warehouse at 9101 Yellow Brick Road were evacuated before noon after the carbon monoxide alarm went off, said Elise Armacost, a Baltimore County Fire Department spokeswoman. An adjoining business also was evacuated. The 10 people taken to Franklin Square Hospital Center all exhibited minor or moderate symptoms of carbon monoxide poisoning, Armacost said.

Managers of an Essex townhouse community troubled by carbon monoxide leaks say the complex should be rid of the dangerous gas by week's end, after stoves are adjusted. Baltimore County officials and firefighters set up a temporary command center at the Cove Village complex Tuesday, and workers will spend two days investigating what they say are faulty stoves in several of the 299 units. Officials say the management company has agreed to replace gas stoves with electric models over time.

Matthew Simmons, Texas author and investment banker and the guy who bet oil will hit $200 a barrel next year, feels pretty good. Oil has doubled to $70 recently as the economy shows signs of life, and "prices do seem poised for the next leg up," he says on the phone. "By sometime a year or two from now, we'll look back and say, yeah, prices were really cheap." Perhaps the leading proponent of the idea that oil is running out, Simmons probably won't win his bet, made with New York Times columnist John Tierney.

Maryland gasoline prices may not be as high as last summer, but they have risen faster than in any previous year. Since the beginning of the year, the average price of a gallon of regular gas in Maryland has increased 63 percent to $2.58 - a steeper climb than last year's march to a record $4.05, according to AAA Mid-Atlantic. The steady climb since the market bottomed out at $1.58 Jan. 2 has raised fears of a return to $3 or $4 gasoline. With gas prices up $1 per gallon since the beginning of the year, some Maryland families are feeling a pinch that even memories of last year's sky-high prices can't ease.

The car industry's embrace of the automobile mileage standards announced yesterday by President Barack Obama is a sure sign of just how overdue they were. California was already moving in the direction of cleaner, more fuel-efficient cars - with states like Maryland committed to follow. There was also a distinct possibility that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency might clamp down further as part of an effort to address the growing threat posed by greenhouse gas emissions and climate change.

Everybody complains about energy costs. Although gas prices have plunged from last summer's highs, energy is still one of the most visible culprits in the inflation that eats away paychecks, government budgets and corporate profits. But $4-a-gallon gas was nothing compared with what's going on in medicine. If petroleum prices had kept pace with health insurance costs over the last three or four decades, we would now be paying $8 a gallon for gas and perhaps looking forward to $15. A small but not insignificant step in the march of the health care monster will take place Wednesday morning before the Maryland Health Services Cost Review Commission.

Back in 1996, the manager of a downtown Burger King handed out discount coupons for ammunition and guns along with the Whoppers with cheese. A week ago, police told us you could buy cocaine from a Shell gas station in Severna Park. And now, the feds tell us your potato chips could come with a Beretta at the Utz kiosk in Lexington Market. I went to lunch Wednesday at the historic shopping stalls in an area the city is trying to revitalize, but all I got was a scowl from the clerk when I ordered a 9 mm. I watched customer after customer, but none left with weaponry.