Peter Zeihan claims the US will lose its strategic oil reserve no matter what happens in Iran

“There’s been a lot of reports in the news that it’s nearing the end of its life and it’s starting to break down,” Zeihan said in a recent YouTube video, referring to the SPR.

He argues the roughly 50-year-old system has been used in ways it was never designed to handle, meaning the U.S. could face problems with the reserve even if tensions with Iran ease.

Why Zeihan says the SPR is wearing out

The SPR was created in 1975, after the Arab oil embargo, to give the U.S. an emergency supply of crude during major disruptions. Presidents have tapped the stockpile during past crises, including wars and hurricanes that disrupted oil production and infrastructure.

Today, that oil is stored in 60 active underground salt caverns across four sites in Texas and Louisiana. Getting the oil out requires pumping water into the bottom of a cavern, which pushes the crude toward the surface.

That process matters to Zeihan’s argument: The caverns were designed to withstand a limited number of full drawdowns, and repeatedly withdrawing and replacing oil can gradually change their shape.

“Every time you do a drawdown, big or small, you basically are putting more water into the cavern, which is dissolving more salt,” Zeihan said, arguing that the process gradually weakens the system.

The Government Accountability Office says repeated partial drawdowns can wear on the same sections of a cavern over time, while each drawdown cycle can gradually reduce how long the storage sites remain viable.

And the reserve has been used much more heavily in recent years. The Department of Energy (DOE) released more than 500 million barrels between 1985 and 2025. That includes the record 180-million-barrel release following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

But Yagiz Sullu, founder and lead analyst at Sullu Strategic Advisory LLC and an energy policy expert, says that doesn’t mean the caverns are about to fail.

“Repeated drawdowns could affect the shape and size of the salt caverns, but that doesn’t mean the Strategic Petroleum Reserve is nearing the end of its life,” Sullu told Moneywise, explaining a recent U.S. Government Accountability Office report indicated that caverns remain in relatively good condition.

The more immediate concern may be the aging infrastructure surrounding them. GAO found that wells, pipelines and other equipment are increasingly limiting how quickly the reserve can be filled or emptied, suggesting the SPR has real problems, but not necessarily the one Zeihan describes.

What a weaker reserve could mean at the pump

That distinction matters because having oil in the reserve is only part of the equation. During a major supply shock, the government also needs to be able to get that oil out quickly enough to make a difference.

At full capacity, the SPR is designed to release up to 4.4 million barrels of oil per day. As of December 2025, DOE estimated the SPR’s effective drawdown capacity at about 2.7 million barrels per day. The agency pointed to construction outages, low inventory at some sites and aging infrastructure as factors limiting the system.

“The U.S. should focus not just on filling the SPR but also on modernizing its aging infrastructure,” Sullu said. “This means repairing or replacing aging wells, pumps, pipelines, and other equipment needed to move oil in and out of the reserve.”

That vulnerability is particularly important during the current conflict with Iran. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz averaged about 4.9 million barrels a day in the second quarter of 2026, down from 21.6 million barrels a day in the final quarter of 2025, before the conflict began.

For consumers, the concern ultimately comes back to prices. The national average for a gallon of regular gas is now about $4.28, according to AAA, and even an end to the conflict may not bring quick relief.

Denton Cinquegrana, chief oil analyst at Dow Jones Energy, told The Guardian in May that a return to $3 gas this year may already be out of reach.