Written by Kavya Guduro, Kantaro Komiya and Lucy Kramer
(Reuters) – The International Energy Agency has included member contributions to free 120 million barrels of crude and petroleum products from emergency stocks with the aim of calming global oil prices after the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
The issue of shares by the US-allied nations of the International Energy Agency, which is made up of 31 mostly industrialized countries but not Russia, will be the second coordinated issuance in a month and the fifth in the agency’s history to counter the oil market turmoil.
It is the largest release from non-US IEA countries as well as the largest issued by the United States.
The United States will match the 60 million barrels draw that other IEA countries have benefited from as part of their 180 million barrel draw from the US Strategic Petroleum Reserve announced in March, bringing total production to 240 million barrels.
This total will be available to the global market within six months, the IEA said.
It was not immediately clear how the US contribution of 60 million barrels broke from the total of 180 million that the United States announced last week, and the International Energy Agency did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.
Global oil prices are heading for their second weekly decline since the United States announced its largest-ever release of oil reserves in late March, with Brent crude down nearly $10, briefly falling below $100 a barrel.
Prices hit a 14-year high last month as Western sanctions against Russia disrupted exports of crude and oil products from the world’s second-largest crude exporter. [O/R]
Total US and IEA releases this year, including the March 1 coordinated release of 60 million barrels, reduce by about 15% the nearly 2.1 billion barrels in storage the group controlled prior to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Japan, the second largest contributor, said it would release 15 million record barrels.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida told reporters late on Thursday that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine was “unforgivable” and that his release would help curb oil prices.
“We must not forgive its invasion and war crimes. We will show our will with firm action,” he said.
Russia says its forces are carrying out a “special operation” in Ukraine and denies targeting civilians.
New Zealand said it would contribute oil and diesel to the IEA issuance.
“Our launch consists of approximately 184,000 barrels of crude oil sequestered in Spain and approximately 299,000 barrels of diesel sequestered in the United Kingdom,” New Zealand Minister for Energy and Resources Megan Woods said in a statement.
Other major contributors include South Korea, Germany, France, Italy and Britain.
Country of a thousand barrels
United States 60559
Japan 15000
South Korea 7230
Germany 6480
France 6047
Italy 5000
United Kingdom 4408
Spain 4000
Turkey 3060
Poland 2298
Australia 1608
Netherlands 1600
Greece 624
Hungary 531
New Zealand 483
Ireland 451
Finland 369
180- Lithuania
74- Estonia
(Reporting by Timothy Gardner in Washington, Noh Browning in London, Kavya Guduru, Suhair Darin and Ashita Shivaprasad in Bengaluru, Lucy Kramer in Wellington, Kantaro Komiya, Tetsushi Kajimoto and Yuka Obayashi in Tokyo; Writing by Florence Tan; Editing by Robert Percell, David Holmes and Kirsten Donovan)
(The title and image for this report may have been reformulated only by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is automatically generated from a shared feed.)
