The US Department of Energy announces that it will start buying back oil in order to fill the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, in the first purchase since the record release this year of 180 million barrels of storage.
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The United States begins to buy back oil for strategic reserves
The US Energy Department said on Friday it will start buying back oil to fill the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, in the first purchase since this year’s record release of 180 million barrels of storage.
A senior official told reporters that the ministry will buy 3 million barrels for delivery in February. The sale pushed 180 million barrels levels Strategic reserves are at their lowest levels since 1984which raised concerns regarding energy security.
The official said that his country will place “a request to buy 3 million barrels of oil for delivery in February of next year.” “This approach will set the price in advance when companies submit their offers,” he added.
This decrease follows The plan announced by US President Joe Biden, last spring to counter rising oil prices. At that time, this program stipulated the withdrawal of a total of 180 million barrels of oil from the strategic reserve.
This plan also aimed to compensate for the long-term production cuts taken by the global oil production alliance, “OPEC +”, consisting of 13 members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries “OPEC” led by Saudi Arabia, and its 10 independent producer allies led by Russia.
Also read: “OPEC +” agrees to reduce oil production by two million barrels per day
He added that the Energy Department would make a swap for regarding 2 million barrels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, which companies would have to return at a later date, to help ease supply shortages at refineries following last week’s oil spill closed the Keystone pipeline.
“We are able to do that at the same time that we buy back 3 million barrels,” the official said.