Letter: Petroleum reserve running on empty?

What's the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR)?

It's basically a rainy-day fund for oil in the United States. "The goal of it has been to essentially make sure that there is enough supply in times of supply constraints, whether that is due to geopolitical impacts or weather related."

None applies to President Biden's releasing one million barrels a day in a strictly a political effort in trying to keep gas prices low for his presidency.

"The government created the reserve after the oil crisis of the 1970s," said Matt Smith, an oil analyst at Kpler, a data and analytics firm. "Since then, it's come in handy a few times, like during the Gulf War in 1991 and after Hurricane Katrina in 2005."

In March, President Biden authorized the release of a million gallons of crude from the SPR every day to boost supply and try to bring down gas prices after Russia invaded Ukraine.

That's not a U.S. war, and now the Department of Energy reports that the reserve is holding less oil than it has in four decades at around 427 million barrels. Also, oil from SPR has been sent to countries overseas with foreign companies bidding on oil that's sold in a competitive auction.

What's next? Ian, Fiona shattered hopes for a quiet hurricane season, could there be another Katrina? "So Katrina came through the U.S. Gulf of Mexico, knocked out a lot of production, and so there were SPR releases to supplement U.S. supply then," Smith said.

Is the U.S. running on empty and President Biden now pressing for a 10 million barrel sale that brings the total sales to 165 million barrels out of the 180 million barrel target to be sold by the end of next month? Who knows?

Robert Meale

Crystal Lake