International Energy Agency (IEA) announced today, March 11, that its member countries will release 400 million barrels of oil reserves—the largest release in history—to mitigate the impact of the Middle East war.
According to Agence France-Presse, IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol said in a statement: “The oil market challenges we face today are unprecedented in scale. Therefore, I am very pleased that IEA member countries are responding with an unprecedented collective emergency action.”
“The oil market is global, so the response to major disruptions must also be global.”
The statement noted that the 32 member countries unanimously agreed in an emergency meeting today to release 400 million barrels of emergency oil reserves to address supply disruptions caused by the Middle East war.
It added: “Emergency reserves will be released to the market according to schedules suited to each member country’s national situation, and some countries will take additional emergency measures to supplement this.”
Success
You are now signed up for our newsletter
Success
Check your email to complete sign up
Iran’s military and Revolutionary Guard have issued warnings and taken actions that have effectively shut down most commercial traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, a key route for oil and natural gas.
The amount of oil reserves released by the IEA this time far exceeds the 182 million barrels released by its member countries in 2022 during Russian President Vladimir Putin’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
The 32 IEA member countries hold over 1.2 billion barrels of public emergency oil reserves. In addition, the industry holds 600 million barrels of reserves under government orders.
