White House Official Calls Oil Swap Unlikely

The White House is unlikely to adopt a proposal to put millions of barrels of crude oil from the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve on the market through an oil swap with energy companies, a U.S. official said. An Energy Department official said Sunday that the department was pursuing the plan, but the White House official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Monday that no formal proposal had been received. Rising oil prices and their effect on home heating oil prices have become a political issue in the run-up to today’s New Hampshire presidential primary. The official outlined steps the administration is taking to lessen the impact of high heating oil costs on consumers. Asked whether that was the administration’s preferred approach to dealing with rising energy prices, as opposed to trying to force prices down, he said: “As a matter of general policy, the administration believes that the price of oil should be established in the marketplace.”