The U.S. Energy Secretary has approved the release of up to 4.5 million barrels of crude oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve in response to the impact from Hurricane Harvey, the Department of Energy said on Friday. That marks an additional 3.5 million barrels on top of the 1 million barrels of oil already approved to be released as of Thursday. “In response to the impacts from Hurricane Harvey, the U.S. Secretary of Energy has authorized the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) to negotiate and execute emergency exchange agreements for up to 4.5 million barrels of crude oil from SPR’s West Hackberry and Bayou Choctaw sites,” Jess Szymanski, a Department of Energy spokeswoman, said in an email. Refiner Phillips 66 ( PSX.N ) Lake Charles, Louisiana facility made two SPR drawdown requests for a total of 400,000 barrels of sweet crude and 600,000 barrels of sour crude from […]