The Biden administration hopes to obtain more funds to purchase oil in order to increase efforts to replenish the United States' depleted emergency reserves.

The Zhītōng Finance app noticed that the US Department of Energy has been slowly replenishing strategic oil reserves, which have experienced an unprecedented decrease since the Russia-Ukraine conflict, falling to the lowest level in 40 years. Two years ago, when faced with soaring retail gasoline prices, the Biden administration ordered the release of a record-breaking 0.18 billion barrels of emergency oil reserves. Since then, the government has purchased about 43.25 million barrels of oil to help replenish emergency reserves, including the 4.65 million barrels announced on Monday.

However, Deputy Energy Secretary David Turk said in an interview that the government's account has only about $1.2 billion left to purchase oil reserves. This is only enough to purchase another 15 million barrels of oil.

"We certainly would like to do more," Turk said. "But we do need additional funds to buy more, and we are in contact with Congress to make sure that everyone is doing their part."

Turk refused to disclose the specific dollar amount of additional crude oil purchases.

In addition, Turk said the Department of Energy is asking Congress to repeal its mandatory requirement for the sale of additional reserves, which was a successful strategy used by the government. Congress originally planned to sell about 0.14 billion barrels of crude oil before the 2027 fiscal year as a means of funding unrelated legislative initiatives. Turk noted that another 0.1 billion barrels of oil sales plan is still in the planning stage.

"We will work with Congress to repeal more of these types of bans," Turk said.

"It seems unlikely in today's Congress and the current market balance that Congress would appropriate new funding for additional oil purchases," said Kevin Book, managing director of ClearView Energy Partners. However, he noted that the situation could change.

Book said that although lawmakers may be more willing to repeal the mandatory reserve sale, deficit hawks in Congress may want to offset lost revenue through offsets, which could cause trouble.

Turk made the comments as the US government is trying to take advantage of falling oil prices. Crude oil prices have fallen about 10% since early April and are below the purchase range of $79 per barrel or less set by the White House.

The Department of Energy said on Monday that it has been replenishing reserves at an average price of $77 per barrel. In addition, the agency said it has accelerated the return of 5.5 million barrels of oil borrowed from oil companies.

ExxonMobil and Macquarie Bank received contracts announced on Monday. The Department of Energy said the oil would be transported to the Bayou Choctaw storage facility in the reserve area from October 1 to December 31.

According to the Department of Energy, the reserve currently holds 0.375 billion barrels of oil. As of the beginning of 2022, the reserve was approximately 0.6 billion barrels.

According to the data from the Department of Energy, the reserve currently holds 0.375 billion barrels of oil. As of early 2022, the reserve was approximately 0.6 billion barrels.