Crude inventories just keep growing at the Cushing tank farm where a record high total of nearly 67 million barrels was reached this week, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
The total was 66,946,000 barrels of oil for the week ending March 4, 2016, an increase of about 100,000 barrels in just a few days time. The Cushing tank farm, considered to be the largest of it kind in the world, started the year at slightly more than 64,000,000 barrels of oil in storage. The March 4 number also makes 19 times that the Cushing stocks topped the 2015 high set April 14, 2015.
The March 4 record also means storage has reached just about 80 percent of the capacity at the tank farm. Just hours after the EIA released news of the Cushing capacity, West Texas Intermediate crude prices rose $1.32 a barrel, reaching $38.09 a barrel.
Some observers felt the Cushing capacity would have increased more than it did, and perhaps that led to a slight increase in oil futures. Still, work is continuing on adding more tanks to the Cushing farm. Plains All American has a project under way and work on three tanks with a total of 810,000 barrels of oil have been finished and could be added soon.
