[rmason]

Had no idea this was political at all or I wouldn't have posted it on here. Seems to me that the strategic reserve should be used to help America only seeing as how tax payers pay for it.

If an American oil company wants to sell their own production to China that would be OK. They shouldn't be able to use oil they procure from a release of the strategic preserve in my opinion. We store the oil to help buffer oil prices from interruptions in production.

[omnicognate]

The video linked by gp says the reason that's possible is that congress lifted a US crude oil export ban in 2015.

Since this is indeed a conservative talking point it's worth noting that the lifting of the ban was passed by a Republican-controlled congress over the objections of then-president Obama, who then signed it despite having previously said he'd veto any lifting of the ban, because the provision was tacked onto a "must-pass" omnibus spending bill. [1]

Of course the right thing here, if there is an actual problem, would be to have a debate about whether to put the ban back in place or make some law specifically about not exporting oil purchased from the strategic reserves, but apparently the Republicans would rather impeach Joe Biden for some reason.

[1] https://www.reedsmith.com/en/perspectives/2015/12/us-governm...

[roenxi]

> Of course the right thing here, if there is an actual problem, would be to have a debate about whether to put the ban back in place or make some law specifically about not exporting oil purchased from the strategic reserves...

If you want to debate that, sure. It won't work because oil is a commodity. If the US cuts itself off from the global markets that would be kinda stupid (because then it can't swap paper for oil, which is a great trade). If it doesn't then any oil it supplies will have knock-on effects making the market price cheaper in some sense. Foreigners would still get about the same benefit.

China tried to ban Australian coal the other day. It was hilariously ineffective. They bought coal from other countries, and we sold coal to the people who just had their coal redirected to China. Net effect, we continued to enjoy the coal boom.

They can try to put that ban in place, but it is meaningless and quite likely can't do anything unless America tries to go full autarky which, ironically, would probably raise the gas price they pay. It is unbelievably tricky to have a commodity market that has 2 different prices for the same good and has any sort of international trade happening.

PS Indeed, due to the magic of markets, if the politicians succeeded there is every change US citizens would be worse off, because they could have traded the oil for something they wanted and then they ended up with something of lower utility. Starve China of oil & the US gets less iPhones for example. If that special gas was used to drive to the Apple store, the scheme would look pretty silly.

[kangaroozach]

Excellent breakdown.

[keybored]

> Had no idea this was political at all or I wouldn't have posted it on here.

You asked

> > What I don't understand is why we're selling oil from the Strategic Reserve to China.

Yeah how on Earth could that even be a political question.

[rapind]

> Had no idea this was political at all or I wouldn't have posted it on here.

This might be true, but a lot of people see that and think "yeah right!". The problem when topics become political is any intelligent discussion gets suffocated.

> We store the oil to help buffer oil prices from interruptions in production.

Sort of, but it's a bit more nuanced I think (right or wrong).

From evergy.gov: ---- The Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), the world's largest supply of emergency crude oil was established primarily to reduce the impact of disruptions in supplies of petroleum products and to carry out obligations of the United States under the international energy program. ----

You could easily argue that what they are currently doing is congruent with this mission by participating strategically in the global market.

I don't know that I agree with it being a good approach from my simpleton perspective, but I doubt it's being done as some sort of pro China move at least.

[anm89]

It isn't. The person above is trying to browbeat you for holding an opinion which is not advantageous to the election prospects of their preferred politician.

[rightbyte]

Isn't the reserve just a buffer? I.e. it does not matter if oil is from the reserve or some oil field directly.

And you want to rotate it anyway so it does not go bad.

[ml_basics]

Does oil go bad? (Genuine question, I have no idea, but assumed it can just be stored indefinitely)

[mdorazio]

Ignore the other answers to you - they're referring to refined products, not crude. Straight from the strategic reserve FAQ, crude oil doesn't really degrade if stored properly: https://www.energy.gov/ceser/spr-faqs#Q14

Note that if it's not stored properly, it can degrade due to water intrusion and oxidation, and it can just evaporate.

[rightbyte]

Oh, ye, well than there is no need to rotate. Assumed the reserve was refined, as it is where I live.

[whoooooo123]

Refined oil products (e.g. the stuff you put in your car) go "bad" because they evaporate. In particular, different substances within the fuel evaporate at different rates, so over time the "mix" degrades away from the optimal ratio. If you put old, degraded fuel into your car it can damage the engine.

You can make fuel last longer by storing it in a cool, dark, airtight place, and there are products you can add to make it last longer, but the general rule is that petrol lasts about 3 months and diesel lasts around 6, or at least that's what I've read.

Entropy, sadly, is an immutable and inescapable law of the universe.

[PaulHoule]

There is a myth that "all gasoline is the same" which is not true because gasoline is not specced to a certain composition but rather to how it burns.

For instance,

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alkene

is added to some gasoline to raise the octane but gas with a high Alkene (or Olefin) content goes bad quickly compared to other gas.

[Etheryte]

Yes, but the time scale varies widely depending on how it's treated. Gas you get at the pump might start degrading as fast as in a few months, as it's meant for immediate consumption and thus treated less to keep costs down. Gas that's treated for long term storage can go for up to a few years, but that adds extra cost. The main sources of degradation are oxidation and contamination, both from air and impurities. If you can, it makes economic sense to rotate the oil like you might rotate a log file so it's always reasonably fresh.

[lostlogin]

> the strategic reserve should be used to help America

If it undermines the pricing China are getting from Russian, maybe it is helping the US tax payer.

[trasz]

Russia is likely selling to China below cost, so nah.

[robertlagrant]

It's talked about by politicians, but it's a perfectly reasonable question outside of that.

Calling such questions "right wing talking points" is the only inappropriate politicisation.

[megablast]

Helping Americans dies t siesta mean making gas cheaper.

The higher the price of gas, the less people killed by cars.

[ThunderSizzle]

The higher the price of gas, people will start die due to skyrocketing energy costs, food Costa, and communting costs.

But you don't actually care about people, just that you can virtue signal that your willing to have half the world die off to save a gallon of fuel.

[Our_Benefactors]

With this model, the ideal price would be $1 million/gal.

[landemva]

This is the point which is overlooked - which of the enumerated powers granted by the people to the federal government allows the federal government to maintain a non-military oil reserve for the purpose of manipulating worldwide prices? Let companies and the free market supply oil.