DOE Continues ‘Swift Execution' of 172MM Barrel SPR Exchange

In a statement posted on its website on Thursday, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced that it has delivered a “historic Request for Proposal (RFP) execution to secure global oil supply stability”.

The DOE noted in the statement that it has issued an RFP for an emergency exchange of up to 92.5 million barrels of crude oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), adding that the solicitation opens competitive bidding, “continuing DOE’s execution of President Trump’s swift 172 million barrel release as part of a coordinated 400 million barrel action by International Energy Agency (IEA) member nations’ strategic reserves”.

The crude oil will originate from the SPR’s Bayou Choctaw, Bryan Mound, Big Hill, and West Hackberry sites, the statement revealed. Bids for this solicitation are due no later than 11:00 AM Central Time on May 4, the statement noted.

In its statement, the DOE highlighted that this action builds on its three previous emergency exchange RFPs. It pointed out that these together awarded approximately 80 million barrels across two completed exchanges.

“DOE’s earlier exchanges demonstrated the SPR’s ability to rapidly deliver crude oil under emergency authorities while securing a 24 percent premium in returned crude oil barrels - growing the reserve at no cost to American taxpayers,” the DOE said.

The DOE noted in the statement that, under its exchange authority, participating companies will return the borrowed 92.5 million barrels of crude “with additional premium barrels, ensuring the SPR grows beyond current levels while delivering immediate supply to refiners and global oil markets”.

“Under President Trump’s leadership, the Department has executed a historic, record-speed series of SPR exchange solicitations - the largest in the Reserve’s 50 year history, moving critical crude oil supplies quickly to market to address short-term oil flow disruptions and strengthen energy security for the United States and its allies,” the DOE stated.

DOE Assistant Secretary for the Hydrocarbons and Geothermal Energy Office, Kyle Haustveit, said in the statement, “with … [this] announcement, we are issuing an additional exchange to continue the President’s commitment to the coordinated release”.

“These actions help move oil quickly into the market, address short-term supply pressures, and ensure that the Strategic Petroleum Reserve remains strong through the return of premium barrels,” he added.

In a statement posted on its site on March 13, the DOE announced that it had issued an RFP for a crude oil exchange from the SPR as part of a 172 million barrel exchange announced earlier that week.

“This first RFP will be for 86 million barrels of crude oil,” the DOE revealed.

“Under the terms of the exchange, companies will return the borrowed oil to DOE with additional barrels as a premium, strengthening the Strategic Petroleum Reserve while stabilizing markets at no cost to American taxpayers,” it added in that statement.

In a statement posted on the DOE’s site on March 11, U.S. Secretary of Energy Chris Wright said, “earlier today, 32 member nations of the International Energy Agency unanimously agreed to President Trump’s request to lower energy prices with a coordinated release of 400 million barrels of oil and refined products from their respective reserves”. 

“As part of this effort, President Trump authorized the Department of Energy to release 172 million barrels from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, beginning next week. This will take approximately 120 days to deliver based on planned discharge rates,” he added.

A release posted on the IEA’s website on March 11 stated that the 32 member countries of the agency unanimously agreed to make 400 million barrels of oil from their emergency reserves available to the market “to address disruptions in oil markets stemming from the war in the Middle East”.

“The decision to take emergency collective action was made following an extraordinary meeting of IEA Member governments yesterday, convened by the IEA Executive Director to assess market conditions amid the conflict in the Middle East and consider the options to address supply disruptions,” that release noted.

“The emergency stocks will be made available to the market over a timeframe that is appropriate to the national circumstances of each member country and will be supplemented by additional emergency measures by some countries,” it added.

This release revealed that IEA members held emergency stockpiles of over 1.2 billion barrels, with a further 600 million barrels of industry stocks held under government obligation. The coordinated stock release is the sixth in the history of the agency, which was created in 1974, the release highlighted, noting that previous collective actions were taken in 1991, 2005, 2011, and twice in 2022.

“The conflict in the Middle East that began on 28 February 2026 has impeded oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz, with export volumes of crude and refined products currently at less than 10 percent of pre-conflict levels,” the release stated.

“This is forcing operators across the region to shut in or curtail a substantial amount of production,” it added.

“An average of 20 million barrels per day of crude oil and oil products transited the Strait of Hormuz in 2025, or around 25 percent of the world’s seaborne oil trade. Options for oil flows to bypass the Strait of Hormuz are limited,” it continued.

In that release, IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol said, “the oil market challenges we are facing are unprecedented in scale, therefore I am very glad that IEA member countries have responded with an emergency collective action of unprecedented size”.

“Oil markets are global so the response to major disruptions needs to be global too. Energy security is the founding mandate of the IEA, and I am pleased that IEA Members are showing strong solidarity in taking decisive action together,” he added.

According to the DOE’s website, the SPR is the world’s largest supply of emergency crude oil and was established primarily to reduce the impact of disruptions in supplies of petroleum products and to carry out obligations of the United States under the international energy program.

“The federally owned oil stocks are stored in huge underground salt caverns at four sites along the coastline of the Gulf of America,” the DOE’s site highlights. 

“The sheer size of the SPR (authorized storage capacity of 714 million barrels) makes it a significant deterrent to oil import cutoffs and a key tool in foreign policy,” it adds.

To contact the author, email andreas.exarheas@rigzone.com