The action is aimed at reducing energy prices to businesses and consumers, and in early trading, futures contracts for West Texas intermediate crude fell 5 dollars a barrel to around $ 90.
The total amount of oil to be released, about half would come from reservations in the United States, with the remainder being provided by other Nations among 28 members of the international agency. Negotiations for the coordinated response were going on in secret for weeks, according to a person involved in the negotiations. Unified similar action was taken in 1991 at the outbreak of the first Persian Gulf war.
"We are taking this action in response to the continuous loss of oil due to interruptions of supply in Libya and other countries and its impact on the recovery of the global economy," said the Secretary of energy Steven Chu in a statement. "As we move forward, we will continue to monitor the situation and be ready to take additional measures if necessary."
The Dow Jones industrial average lost 165 points at the opening of trading, shortly after the announcement of Paris, but some traders said the large fall was partly a reaction to a sharp increase in weekly applications for unemployment benefits in the United States.
Even if the talks went on behind the scenes, the prices have come down a little in American gasoline pumps. The average price of a gallon of regular gasoline fell to $ $3,61, daily report of AAA fuel meter said Thursday, compared with $ $3,83 a month ago. A year ago, the price was $ $2,74 per gallon.
Of course, the more prices could come down, if at all, with the release of oil reserves, which is not a large amount of data that oil consumption worldwide is approximately 89 million barrels per day.
The oil to be released is light sweet crude, similar to the type of Libya produces. The war in Libya since mid-March has been largely responsible for maintaining approximately 140 million barrels of oil on international markets, according to Government estimates.
Mark Routt, senior consultant for KBC Energy Economics, said he was "a little surprised" by the announcement, saying that the market had already responded to the lack of Libyan oil.
"That made the adjustments and trade flows and patterns to replace that of Libya," he said. "The other issue is all the nuances of that quality of crude oil that they are releasing. It is clear that they are releasing will be a suitable quality ".
He added: "the market had already been moving lower in terms of price. All of these questions come to the point of ' why now? ' ”
The barrel of 727 million petroleum strategic reserve was established before the oil embargo of 1973-1974 Arab to provide Presidents with emergency response to similar disruptions in commercial supply that threatens the economy and national security. According to the Department of energy, is the world's largest stockpile of emergency oil State.
With the release of 1991, in September 2005 President George w. Bush ordered a withdrawal after Hurricane Katrina disrupted oil supplies from the Gulf Coast region. The release of 1991 was approximately 17 million barrels; the launch of hurricanes of 2005 was 21 million barrels.
A person with knowledge of the decision said that seemed to be driven by several factors: the political calendar of the United States; the need to drive down prices for advanced economies; the anticipated increase in demand as the summer vacation season Gets under way; and frustration with the defeat by OPEC to increase production.
"You don't get elected with gas at $ 4 per gallon," he said. "If you were looking at just the basics, I.E.A. would have moved after the crude oil from Libya out of the market." He added: "it seems that it's about price management, but you'll never hear that I.E.A."
Christine Hauser contributed reporting from New York; Matthew Saltmarsh contributed from Paris.
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