Old North News

With the goal of bringing down gas prices for American consumers, President Biden announced the use of Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR)  crude oil on March 31. However, this has not had the intended effect, and gas prices remain high. 

Data shows that since the release, the president has reduced the SPR by nearly 85 million barrels.

U.S. Rep. Clay Higgins (R-LA) took to Twitter to point out that in June, the SPR  inventory fell to the lowest level since 1986. Additionally, contrary to what Biden promised Americans, the price of gas has increased by over 6%  since the SPR was tapped and the Gas Misery Index is still high in the state of North Carolina.

"Wake up America. 1 million barrels per day is being released from the  Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Biden is draining the SPR, which last month fell to the lowest since 1986," Higgins wrote.

As of April 1, the SPR held 564.58  million barrels of oil in stock  As of July 15, the SPR inventory stood at 480.1 million barrels of oil,  a decrease of 84.48 million barrels since Biden's initial release.                  

 Although gas prices have fluctuated over the past few months, gas price data from July 19 shows a 6.6% increase in the price of gas since the day Biden announced the oil release on March 31. On that day, gas was $4.22 per gallon, 28 cents cheaper than the national average as of July 19, which is $4.50 per gallon, according to AAA.   On Thursday, March 31, President Biden announced the release of up to 180 million barrels of crude oil from the nation's  Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) over six months, in his effort to curb high gas prices. The president said there would be a slight delay in declining gas prices by days and weeks, but the prices would eventually drop by an unknown range.                 

In the early 1970s, the SPR was created by Congress following the Arab oil embargo with the intent to maintain a reserve to address severe supply disruptions, CNBC reported. A recent press release from the Functional Government Initiative points out that there has been no major disruption in the oil supply that would have warranted such a withdrawal.

The latest Gasoline Misery Index, which tracks how much more (or less) the average American consumer will have to spend on gasoline on an annualized basis, reports that the average North Carolina resident is spending around $788 more on gas this year when compared to the same time a year ago.