increasing its per occurrence limit by $25 million to $250 million.

The new limit will come into effect on January 1, 2001 and represents "one of the single largest amounts of net capacity offered by any insurer'', according to president and CEO of the company, Jon King.

"This combined with the energy industry expertise of our board of directors and shareholders, allows us to continue to develop new products and focus on finding solutions to the needs of the international energy community,'' he said.

The decision to increase the per occurrence limit was made at a special board of directors meeting held late last week. The Board also decided at that meeting to increase the aggregation limit for all losses from multiple members arising out of one event to $1 billion.

The changes according to Mr. King keep the proposed rates for 2001 unchanged on 2000 and at the lowest level in the near 30 year history of the company.

"With the commercial insurance markets suffering from very low returns in the energy sector, this should make member ship of OIL a very attractive alternative for the buyers of energy insurance,'' he said.