Biden Administration Releasing 1 Million Barrels From Gas Reserves In Bid To Lower Prices—Which Trump Blasts As Campaign Stunt
KEY FACTS
The Department of Energy will sell 1 million barrels (42 million gallons) in a move the department said will “maximize its impact on gasoline prices” as “Americans hit the road this summer.”
Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm claimed the gas will be “strategically releas[ed]”between Memorial Day and July 4, in hopes of “ensuring sufficient supply flows to the tri-state and northeast.”
The reserve, an Obama-era initiative borne out of Hurricane Sandy in 2012, will effectively close as a result of the sale, according to GasBuddy analyst Patrick De Haan.
De Haan said the move “does make sense,” admitting the timing of the decision might “lead some to be suspect,” but that the sale and effective closure means the reserve will not need to be refueled each spring, referring to the reserve as a “frustration for the industry.”
BIG NUMBER
227.8 million. That’s the U.S. supply of gasoline, according to the Energy Information Administration’s latest update last week. That supply puts the U.S. above its 218.3 million-barrel mark a year ago.
CHIEF CRITIC
Former President Donald Trump criticized the move, arguing President Joe Biden is only opening up the reserves “in a bid to lower prices before the election” and that gas prices are “higher than they’ve been in a long time” (the national average for a gallon of gas is $3.60, according to AAA, over $1.40 below its all-time peak in June 2022). Trump also claimed gas prices are “now higher than they’ve been in a long time” and that Biden is taking the reserve route “because he’s unable to drill properly,” in comments to reporters outside the courtroom where his hush money trial is taking place. Although the former president did not provide any specific examples of Biden’s drilling policy, he has repeatedly taken aim at Biden’s push for renewable energy and electric vehicles.
CONTRA
While Biden has taken action to shield millions of acres from drilling and mining in multiple states, including Alaska and Montana, he hasn’t exactly seen eye-to-eye with green energy advocates on fossil fuel production, including for a controversial drilling project in Alaska. Last March, the Biden administration approved the roughly $8 billion-$10 billion ConocoPhillips drilling project within the state’s National Petroleum Reserve, in hopes of generating up to 600 million barrels of oil over the next 30 years. Biden took heat for that approval from several Democratic lawmakers and the Sierra Club, whose director Ben Jealous warned Biden’s approval “made it almost impossible to achieve the climate goals they set for public lands.”
WHAT TO WATCH FOR
Gas prices dropped this week in a long-awaited reprieve for motorists ahead of Memorial Day weekend, when AAA expects 38.4 million Americans will hit the road, an increase from 36.9 million last year. Analysts project the national average for a gallon of gasoline to remain in the mid-$3 range over the holiday weekend, though drivers on the West Coast can expect prices between $4 and $6 per gallon. The price in California is $5.19 on average, the highest in the country, according to AAA.
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