Funding Bill Blocks China From Buying Oil From U.S. Reserve

A measure in the US funding legislation unveiled by congressional leaders would block China from buying oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), Timothy Gardner reported for Reuters.

The issue of SPR sales to China heated up after President Joe Biden, a Democrat, announced in 2022 a sale of 180 million barrels of SPR oil to tame gasoline prices that spiked after Russia's invasion of Ukraine. I Photo: Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas

The desire for a hard line on China is one of the few truly bipartisan sentiments in the deeply divided US Congress, and lawmakers have introduced dozens of bills seeking to address competition with China's government.

The issue of SPR sales to China heated up after President Joe Biden, a Democrat, announced in 2022 a sale of 180 million barrels of SPR oil to tame gasoline prices that spiked after Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

That year, the SPR sold 1 million barrels to UNIPEC America, a Houston-based arm of China's Sinopec.

In 2017, under former President Donald Trump, some SPR oil was sold to PetroChina International, a subsidiary of Chinese state oil company PetroChina Co Ltd.

The SPR currently holds more than 360 million barrels of oil but is close to 40-year lows due to the sales in 2022. Last July, the Democratic-controlled Senate passed a bill 85 to 14 to ban exports to China of SPR oil.

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