Exclusive: West Coast emergency oil reserve sparks pushback from Senate Democrats

By Matt Egan, CNN

(CNN) — A pair of Senate Democrats are calling for the Trump administration to abandon efforts to build a West Coast emergency oil reserve.

In a letter dated Wednesday to Energy Secretary Chris Wright, Sens. Alex Padilla and Patty Murray warn that establishing a West Coast Strategic Petroleum Reserve this fiscal year would flout the law and usurp congressional authority.

“We also request that the Department cease all work to establish any new West Coast Strategic Petroleum Reserve until it has followed the process Congress has laid out,” Padilla and Murray wrote in the letter, which was shared first with CNN.

The plan for a West Coast Strategic Petroleum Reserve came this month from Sable Offshore Corp. The proposed reserve would be an extension of the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR), a federal emergency stockpile that has been depleted by back-to-back wars involving Russia and now Iran.

According to Politico, Sable said the proposal was made “in response to the inquiries made by the Trump administration and… ongoing discussions with the Department of War for the supply of oil and gas to California.”

Details about the proposal are unclear, and Sable did not respond to a request for comment.

However, Wright confirmed to Politico this month that the Trump administration is in “active dialogue” about creating a West Coast emergency oil reserve.

CNN reached out to the Energy Department for comment.

‘Historic lows’

The SPR, located in salt caverns along the Gulf Coast, currently holds the least amount of oil since 1983 when the Reagan administration was filling it.

The Senate Democrats suggested in their letter that the West Coast project is being driven by politics, not need. The Energy Department should focus on “reinforcing existing reserves… not pursuing costly new proposals driven by political considerations,” they wrote.

Padilla and Murray added that the “needs, expansion or operation” of the federal SPR “should not be dictated by any one commercial entity.”

The lawmakers requested that Wright provide a full description of current and planned activities to set up a new regional reserve and “all correspondence” with Sable about this issue.

In March, the Trump administration – at the request of Sable – invoked the Defense Production Act to order the company to restart shuttered offshore operations in California.

California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office condemned the move as a “desperate political stunt” that it said threatened the state’s coastal communities.

Legislative problems

Restrictions in annual spending bills pose another barrier for projects like the West Coast SPR, Padilla and Murray wrote. They cited a report in the Fiscal Year 2026 Energy and Water Appropriations bill that prohibits regional petroleum reserves unless funding is requested in advance and approved by Congress.

The lawmakers noted that the Energy Department’s fiscal 2026 budget, released last May, did not contain funding for a regional petroleum reserve.

“As such, any establishment of a new reserve this fiscal year would violate Congressional intent,” Padilla and Murray wrote.

A spokesperson for Padilla told CNN that “a unilateral decision by this administration – which seems to be at the request of a private commercial entity, or to paper over the Iran War’s catastrophic effect on global oil prices – is not only irresponsible and unconnected to national security needs, but also against the law.”

California the energy island?

Tom Kloza, an independent oil analyst and advisor to Gulf Oil, told CNN that the idea of a West Coast SPR is unlikely to gain traction.

“It’s a bit of a pipe dream, and it looks like a little pet project between the offshore company and the Trump administration,” Kloza said.

Wright has argued there are national security benefits to improving California’s energy security, especially given military assets located in the state.

“California is a military launch pad for the Pacific Ocean, huge amount of facilities here,” he told Politico last month after touring Sable’s oil facilities. “What is it that we can do to make California and our national defense more secure? It just stands out as this very unfortunate expensive energy isolated island.”

The problem is that California lacks major oil pipelines connecting it with the rest of the nation’s oil supply. That makes the state vulnerable to supply shocks such as the one caused by the war with Iran and virtual shutdown of the Strait of Hormuz.

Not only that, but California has very specific fuel specifications aimed at minimizing smog.

“California is something of an island, not just because of its fuel specifications but for the oil it can rely on in an emergency,” said Kevin Book, managing director and head of research at ClearView Energy Partners, an independent research firm. “It’s a real security question.”

During the current crisis, the Trump administration waived the Jones Act, allowing US-flagged vessels to carry emergency and commercial crude from the Gulf Coast to California through the Panama Canal. However, Kloza said the real issue is California lacks refining capacity, not access to crude oil.

He noted that the West Coast SPR proposal appears to call for stockpiling crude, not gasoline, jet fuel or other refined products. That means it would do “nothing” to address California’s central challenge.

“If one refinery goes down in a fire, earthquake or even a power outage, prices will go parabolic in California,” he said.

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