[iav]

That's probably because previous Congressional acts mandated regular sales from the SPR as evidenced here https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=35032

Not to mention the 10M barrels we sold just to pay for the upkeep (it's like selling gas from my car to pay for new brakes - we shouldn't be bartering oil for maintenance expenses).

But a trade is a trade - had they not bought the 77M the SPR would have dropped by 74M rather than the increase of 3M.