§ 6240 — Petroleum Products For Storage, Transport, Or Exchange

(a) The Secretary may acquire, place in storage, transport, or exchange petroleum products acquired by purchase or exchange. (b) The Secretary shall, to the greatest extent practicable, acquire petroleum products for the Reserve in a manner consonant with the following objectives: (1) minimization of the cost of the Reserve; (2) Repealed. Pub. L. 106–469, title I, § 103(14)(C), Nov. 9, 2000, 114 Stat. 2031; (3) minimization of the Nation’s vulnerability to a severe energy supply interruption; (4) minimization of the impact of such acquisition upon supply levels and market forces; and (5) encouragement of competition in the petroleum industry. (c) The Secretary shall develop, with public notice and opportunity for comment, procedures consistent with the objectives of this section to acquire petroleum for the Reserve. Such procedures shall take into account the need to— (1) maximize overall domestic supply of crude oil (including quantities stored in private sector inventories); (2) avoid incurring excessive cost or appreciably affecting the price of petroleum products to consumers; (3) minimize the costs to the Department of the Interior and the Department of Energy in acquiring such petroleum products (including foregone revenues to the Treasury when petroleum products for the Reserve are obtained through the royalty-in-kind program); (4) protect national security; (5) avoid adversely affecting current and futures prices, supplies, and inventories of oil; and (6) address other factors that the Secretary determines to be appropriate. (d) (f) If the Secretary finds that a severe energy supply interruption may be imminent, the Secretary may suspend the acquisition of petroleum product for, and the injection of petroleum product into, the Reserve and may sell any petroleum product acquired for and in transit to, but not injected into, the Reserve. (g) (1) If the President finds that declines in the production of oil from domestic resources pose a threat to national energy security, the President may direct the Secretary to acquire oil from domestic production of stripper well properties for storage in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve. Except as provided in paragraph (2), the Secretary may set such terms and conditions as he deems necessary for such acquisition. (2) Crude oil purchased by the Secretary pursuant to this subsection shall be by competitive bid. The price paid by the Secretary— (A) shall take into account the cost of production including costs of reservoir and well maintenance; and (B) shall not exceed the price that would have been paid if the Secretary had acquired petroleum products of a similar quality on the open market under competitive bid procedures without regard to the source of the petroleum products.