USA Crude Oil Inventories Drop 3 Million Barrels Week on Week

U.S. commercial crude oil inventories, excluding those in the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), decreased by three million barrels from the week ending July 25 to the week ending August 1, the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) highlighted in its latest weekly petroleum status report.

That report was released on August 6 and included data for the week ending August 1. It showed that crude oil stocks, not including the SPR, stood at 423.7 million barrels on August 1, 426.7 million barrels on July 25, and 429.3 million barrels on August 2, 2024. Crude oil in the SPR stood at 403.0 million barrels on August 1, 402.7 million barrels on July 25, and 375.8 million barrels on August 2, 2024, the report revealed.

Total petroleum stocks – including crude oil, total motor gasoline, fuel ethanol, kerosene type jet fuel, distillate fuel oil, residual fuel oil, propane/propylene, and other oils – stood at 1.662 billion barrels on August 1, the report highlighted. Total petroleum stocks were up 2.3 million barrels week on week and down 3.3 million barrels year on year, the report showed.

“At 423.7 million barrels, U.S. crude oil inventories are about six percent below the five year average for this time of year,” the EIA said in its latest weekly petroleum status report.

“Total motor gasoline inventories decreased by 1.3 million barrels from last week and are about one percent below the five year average for this time of year. Both finished gasoline inventories and blending components inventories decreased last week,” it added.

“Distillate fuel inventories decreased by 0.6 million barrels last week and are about 16 percent below the five year average for this time of year. Propane/propylene inventories increased by 1.3 million barrels from last week and are eight percent above the five year average for this time of year,” the EIA continued.

U.S. crude oil refinery inputs averaged 17.1 million barrels per day during the week ending August 1, according to the EIA’s report, which pointed out that this was 213,000 barrels per day more than the previous week’s average.

“Refineries operated at 96.9 percent of their operable capacity last week,” the EIA said in its weekly petroleum status report.

“Gasoline production decreased last week, averaging 9.8 million barrels per day. Distillate fuel production decreased by 104,000 barrels per day last week, averaging 5.1 million barrels per day,” it added.

U.S. crude oil imports averaged 6.0 million barrels per day last week, the report noted. It highlighted that this was a decrease of 174,000 barrels per day from the previous week.

“Over the past four weeks, crude oil imports averaged about 6.1 million barrels per day, 9.7 percent less than the same four-week period last year,” the EIA said in the report.

“Total motor gasoline imports (including both finished gasoline and gasoline blending components) last week averaged 535,000 barrels per day, and distillate fuel imports averaged 79,000 barrels per day,” it added.

Total products supplied over the last four-week period averaged 20.6 million barrels a day, up by 1.6 percent from the same period last year, the EIA stated in its report.

“Over the past four weeks, motor gasoline product supplied averaged 8.9 million barrels a day, down by 2.2 percent from the same period last year,” the EIA highlighted.

“Distillate fuel product supplied averaged 3.5 million barrels a day over the past four weeks, down by 3.8 percent from the same period last year. Jet fuel product supplied was up 3.8 percent compared with the same four-week period last year,” the EIA continued.

The EIA also highlighted in its report that the price for West Texas Intermediate crude oil was $68.39 per barrel on August 1, which it noted was “$2.01 more than a week ago, and $6.6 less than a year ago”.

The EIA added in the report that the national average retail price for regular gasoline “increased to $3.140 per gallon on August 4, 2025, $0.017 more than last week’s price, and $0.308 less than the year-ago price”. The national average retail diesel fuel price “decreased $0.005 to $3.800 per gallon, $0.045 more than the price one year ago,” the EIA noted in its report.

According to the AAA Fuel Prices website, as of August 7, the average price of regular gasoline in the U.S. is $3.166 per gallon and the average price of diesel in the country is $3.737 per gallon.

In an oil and gas report sent to Rigzone by the Macquarie team late Monday, Macquarie strategists, including Walt Chancellor, revealed that they were forecasting that U.S. crude inventories would be up by 1.3 million barrels for the week ending August 1.

“This follows a 7.7 million barrel build in the prior week, with the crude balance again realizing looser than our expectations,” the strategists said in the report.

In its previous weekly petroleum status report, which was released on July 30 and included data for the week ending July 25, the EIA highlighted that U.S. commercial crude oil inventories, excluding those in the SPR, increased by 7.7 million barrels from the week ending July 18 to the week ending July 25.

To contact the author, email andreas.exarheas@rigzone.com