Donald Trump spent his 2024 campaign hammering Biden for emptying America's emergency oil stockpile, pledging to refill it the moment he took office. Now a shooting war in the Middle East is testing whether that promise was ever realistic.
And worse, the strategic oil reserve can’t physically handle this kind of fill-and-empty cycling. It’s oil that’s been pumped into an old salt mine, the mine’s structure gets stressed every time the oil level changes. It’s going to collapse someday.
And worse, the strategic oil reserve can’t physically handle this kind of fill-and-empty cycling. It’s oil that’s been pumped into an old salt mine, the mine’s structure gets stressed every time the oil level changes. It’s going to collapse someday.