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Subscribers to API’s Weekly Statistical Report to receive historical data adjusted to meet upcoming EIA inventory reporting guidelines


Reid Porter | porterr@api.org | 202.682.8114


WASHINGTON, September 23, 2016 – Starting Oct. 13, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) will no longer include crude oil lease stocks in the U.S. total commercial crude inventory data series. This change, recently announced as a requirement by the EIA, will exclude oil that is stored in tanks on lease lands where production is taking place prior to being transferred for commercial stock storage. Lease stocks currently amount to nearly 31 million barrels of oil.

“API is working to ensure the transition to EIA’s new reporting requirements is as smooth as possible for our customers, and we are notifying our subscribers on EIA’s adjustment to their reporting requirements,” said Hazem Arafa, director of API's statistics department. “Both API and EIA publish estimates every week, with subscribers to API’s weekly statistical report receiving the latest inventory data the afternoon prior to the EIA’s weekly statistical report.”

In the announcement, EIA stated that the change is due to the agency’s interpretation that “lease stocks are not yet available for commercial use and that in many cases operators do not count them as production until they are transferred off of the lease via pipeline, rail, or trucks to tank farms for storage.” EIA says that it will issue additional details prior to Oct. 13 to assist with analysis of the adjusted inventory data and that “the change to exclude lease stocks from reported commercial inventories beginning with the  [EIA’s Weekly Petroleum Status] report published on October 13 should not affect WPSR users who focus on week-to-week changes in commercial crude oil inventories.”

“API will get ahead of EIA’s reporting changes and provide adjusted historical data to our subscribers that meet the agency’s new guidelines and help analysts continue their work,” said Arafa. “This data will be provided well ahead of the EIA’s announced date as an added benefit to our clients who rely on that historical information for crude inventory data, forward-looking reports and timely market analysis.”

Since 1929, API’s Weekly Statistical Bulletin (WSB) has reported total U.S. and regional crude inventories. API is the premier source for petroleum industry data and information. API's data and statistics are comprehensive, timely, and quoted widely.  Companies voluntarily send API an exact copy of the data they send to EIA, using the same weekly survey forms that EIA uses. Neither API nor EIA collect 100 percent of the data. Both publish estimates every week. API makes its WSB reports available solely via subscription purchase through authorized distributor Thomson Reuters. New customers interested in subscribing to the reports, please visit the Commodities area of the Thomson Reuters website, and click the "Contact Sales" button.

API is the only national trade association representing all facets of the oil and natural gas industry, which supports 9.8 million U.S. jobs and 8 percent of the U.S. economy. API’s more than 650 members include large integrated companies, as well as exploration and production, refining, marketing, pipeline, and marine businesses, and service and supply firms. They provide most of the nation’s energy and are backed by a growing grassroots movement of more than 30 million Americans.

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