[dredmorbius]

The SPR has ... at least some precedents ... in the earlier Naval Petroleum Reserve, which was specifically created as insurance of supply of oil to the (recently converted-from-coal) US Navy, which dates to 1910 (Pickett Act) under President William Howard Taft.

At the time, petroleum was still relatively novel and poorly understood geologically --- how much existed and how long supplies would last would be hotly debated in an argument that continues to the present, though much geological and paleological origin and genesis understanding was achieved between the 1950s and 1990s. But in the 1920s (and for considerable time afterwards) there was great uncertainty as to how long useful access might persist. It was also abundantly clear that petroleum was an absolute game-changing factor (and instigator of) 20th century warfare.

The Naval Petroleum Reserve played a starring role in the biggest US political scandal until Watergate, the Teapot Dome Scandal of the Harding Administration (1921--23), leading to the first criminal conviction and imprisonment of a US Cabinet official (Albert B. Fall, Interior).

The Naval Reserve was transferred to the US Department of Energy in 1977 by US President Jimmie Carter, though the US Navy continued to direct the programme for another 20 years.

<https://www.energy.gov/sites/default/files/NPR_90_years_tri-...>

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_of_Naval_Petroleum_and_...>

<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teapot_Dome_scandal>