In Reply to: Suddenly, Hormuz is Less Crucial Than It Was posted by mh on July 14, 2026 at 12:33:21
Since the war began, we have been drawing down a bit less than 1 million barrels per day from the SPR.
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Oil supplies in the SPR stand precariously close to what could be a limit.
Sizing studies done on the SPR in the 1970s recommended an inventory minimum of 250 million barrels. The reserve can hold up to 727 million barrels.
So, if the congressionally mandated minimum is at about 250 million barrels and there are just over 300 million barrels left in the SPR, the U.S. possibly could release 1 million barrels per day for 60 days, or 2 million barrels a day for 30 days, noted Michael Lynch, president of Strategic Energy & Economic Research.
“Then what?” Lynch asked. “Trump could ignore the law,” he told MarketWatch — but operationally, going below 250 million barrels can create technical problems. “Trump appears to have trouble parsing the complex nature of the oil market.”