Crude oil inventories rose by 14.865 million barrels, American Petroleum Institute (API) data showed on Tuesday, as refining activity begins to return to normal following previous weather-related shutdowns. U.S. crude inventories increased 13 million barrels over the course of 2022, according to API data, while crude stored in the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserves sunk by 221 million barrels.
The large build in commercial crude oil inventories comes as the Department of Energy released 0.8 million barrels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserves in the week ending January 6, leaving the SPR with just 371.6 million barrels. The SPR now contains the least amount of crude oil since early December 1983. It also comes as refiners were still working to restart refineries after cold-induced shutdowns. U.S. crude oil production rose to 12.1 million bpd in the final week of the year, bringing the total production increase for 2022 to 400,000 bpd , and 1 million bpd lower than peak production seen in March 2020 NN: These are the missing barrels showing up… And their is a lot of excess barrels that need to be burned off… After the COVID die off China will come to the rescue