The stockpile is forecast to dwindle to a 40-year low by October
Washington has been actively selling from its Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) over the past year to keep energy prices from rising even higher, Bloomberg reported on Friday, noting that the government can’t keep tapping the reserves forever.
According to the report, over the past year almost 115 million barrels were released into the market. Those sales have soared to a record high of nearly one million barrels per day since mid-May. At the current rate, the United States is selling more barrels from its reserve than the production of most medium-sized OPEC countries, such as Algeria or Angola.
The SPR contains two kinds of crude: medium-sour, which is the quality of crude pumped by Russia, most Middle Eastern countries and Venezuela, as well as light-sweet crude.
Bloomberg’s analysis of official data showed that 85% of the oil sold from the SPR over the past year has been medium-sour. Those sales have reduced the amount of crude inside the reserve “dramatically.”
If Washington sticks to its current pace, the reserves will shrink to a 40-year low of 358 million barrels by the end of October, when the releases are due to stop. A year ago, the SPR, located in four caverns in Texas and Louisiana, reportedly contained 621 million barrels.
“As the oil market looks today, it’s difficult to see how Washington can halt sales in October. Removing that additional supply would mean commercial inventories quickly deplete, putting upward pressure on oil prices,” says the report.
According to OilX estimates, cited by Bloomberg, by the end of October the SPR will hold only 179 million barrels of medium-sour crude. This means that during the period from June 2021 to October 2022, the US is likely to sell about 180-190 million barrels of medium-sour crude from its reserves.
I find it difficult to trust anything the MSM reports. The US is the largest oil producing nation today. Thousands of wells in the Gulf have been tapped and capped for a later date. Maybe the banksters raised fuel rates, by holding back in order to pay the $50 Billion loan for the Ukraine fiasco. This is what they do, pass the cost of every mistake they make onto the slave class.
All true, but think what that means for the gas prices just before the midterm elections in November. And what that means for the coming winter in the West.
Strong feeling that it’s all planned, and all going according to plan.
I agree, sort of. My feeling is that they were prepared for the day of reckoning, by fighting back using the “pandemic” card, the “environment/green” card, the “great reset” card, the “war and sanctions” card, etc.
But, but — they did not, could not possibly have planned their own demise. And that appears to be inevitable. The Anglozionist center of power is undergoing a systemic terminal failure.