31.   Chernomyrdin has been accused of profiting handsomely from his ties with the gas company.

32.   Chernomyrdin stepped down as prime minister a few months later and became chief executive of Gazprom, the giant state-controlled gas company.

33.   Craig Whyte, a Nicor spokesman, said the gas company immediately began alerting the public of the risk and cleaning up the toxic substance.

34.   Currently, it shares its pipeline with a gas company called Itera, which sells gas to countries of the former Soviet Union.

35.   Edison executives also have their eye on gas companies, another distribution business.

36.   Enron is more leveraged to natural-gas price increases, he said, than any other domestic gas company.

37.   Earlier, McHale had been visited earlier by Harold Wagner, the chief executive of Air Products and Chemicals, a large industrial gas company in the district.

38.   Eleven holding companies of electric utilities and several that hold gas companies are now governed by the law.

39.   Energy Corp., a privately-held oil and gas exploration company based in Denver, Colorado, saw strong demand for its debt.

40.   Enron owns stakes in natural gas distribution systems in seven Brazilian states and in two Rio de Janeiro gas companies, Cia. Estadual de Gas and Riogas.