What was the SPR data on this week's weekly report?  Did the US drawdown some amount from there?

OK, I didn't see a SPR draw at all here:

http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petroleum/data_publications/weekly_petroleum_status_report/curren t/txt/wpsr.txt

But, I did notice this endnote and never realized what it could mean:

1 Crude oil stocks in the SPR include non-U.S. stocks held under foreign or commercial storage agreements.

This could literally mean we have tanks or fields reserved just for the US all around the world?

The US SPR has roughly 700 million barrels in it. Then there are privately held stockpiles by the oil majors and other corporations. Gap between consumption and consumption in the US appears to have steadily held in the neighborhood of 1 mbpd for quite some time now. I believe Westexas noted that we've seen about 60 million barrels drawn down in the current quarter so far? If my memory is incorrect here, perhaps WT or someone else can give me the correct numbers.

Anyway, given those rough numbers, the current gap can be covered for a long while (a few years) unless the gap grows larger. This is the question that WT has raised - can we continue to expect growing imports at a time when the exporting nations are cutting back production and seeing internal consumption growth of their own? A key consideration is whether this is peak or not. If not, then theoretically and at least for a few more years, production could increase although demand could still outstrip production pushing prices higher even as production rises. But if this is peak and production cannot rise while demand continues trying to rise, then the market mechanism will balance the distribution of oil production to consumption - via price. However, even if this is not the exact peak, we can still get what I believe Robert calls "peak lite" effects of production failing to keep pace with demand.

My own view is that I agree with Stuart's previous assessment that peak is about now. However, even if not, and if peak is 2010 or 2011, it doesn't matter much because we're likely to get Robert's "peak lite" anyway. We're too close to the peak to alter the impact appreciably at this time and so we get to ride whatever wave emanates outward from this, positive or negative. We gave up our chance to control that wave years ago.