Oui, au d\u00e9but de l'ann\u00e9e, \u00e0 un rythme record, puis d\u00e9lib\u00e9r\u00e9ment en baisse. Les premi\u00e8res donn\u00e9es commerciales montrent que la Chine ajoutera environ 1,24 million de barils par jour \u00e0 ses stocks de p\u00e9trole brut d\u00e9but 2026, contre environ 1,1 million de barils par jour en moyenne en 2025, ce qui portait les stocks totaux \u00e0 pr\u00e8s de 1,4 milliard de barils. La perturbation du d\u00e9troit d'Ormuz \u00e0 partir de fin f\u00e9vrier a modifi\u00e9 la donne\u00a0: le Brent d\u00e9passant les 100 dollars le baril, la Chine a r\u00e9duit ses importations \u00e0 environ 7,8 millions de barils par jour en mai, son niveau le plus bas depuis pr\u00e8s de dix ans, et a puis\u00e9 dans ses stocks au lieu d'acheter pour profiter de la flamb\u00e9e des prix. Les pr\u00e9visions d'avant crise de l'EIA (environ 1 million de barils par jour de stockage) et de FGE (environ 730\u00a0000 barils par jour) restent pertinentes pour l'ensemble de l'ann\u00e9e\u00a0: le d\u00e9veloppement des capacit\u00e9s de stockage se poursuit et l'accumulation devrait reprendre avec la normalisation des prix.<\/p>\n
Jusqu'en 2025, la Chine a augment\u00e9 ses stocks strat\u00e9giques et commerciaux combin\u00e9s de p\u00e9trole brut \u00e0 un rythme moyen d'environ 1,1 million de barils par jour, soit la plus forte accumulation jamais enregistr\u00e9e par un pays. En d\u00e9cembre 2025, les stocks totaux avoisinaient 1,4 milliard de barils\u00a0: environ 360 millions de barils dans la r\u00e9serve strat\u00e9gique contr\u00f4l\u00e9e directement par le gouvernement et environ 1 milliard de barils dans les r\u00e9servoirs commerciaux que P\u00e9kin consid\u00e8re de plus en plus comme strat\u00e9giques, ayant ordonn\u00e9 \u00e0 ses compagnies p\u00e9troli\u00e8res nationales de constituer des r\u00e9serves d'urgence.<\/p>\n
La nouvelle ann\u00e9e a d\u00e9marr\u00e9 sur un rythme encore plus soutenu. Les premi\u00e8res donn\u00e9es commerciales et gouvernementales pour d\u00e9but 2026 indiquent des ajouts d'environ 1,24 million de barils par jour, inf\u00e9rieurs au rythme mensuel record \u00e9tabli en d\u00e9cembre, mais sup\u00e9rieurs \u00e0 la moyenne annuelle de 2025. La logique \u00e9tait simple\u00a0: les prix au d\u00e9but de 2026 restaient dans une fourchette jug\u00e9e attractive par P\u00e9kin, de nouvelles capacit\u00e9s de stockage \u00e9taient mises en service dans le cadre du programme d'\u00c9tat et la directive politique en faveur de la constitution de stocks demeurait inchang\u00e9e.<\/p>\n
None of this is officially published. Beijing releases no reserve statistics, so every figure here is an estimate assembled from customs data, satellite tank-gauging and refinery runs, the same triangulation that produces the range of numbers explored across our companion dossiers on the stockpile’s size and days of cover.<\/p>\n
From late February 2026 the conflict in the Middle East largely closed the Strait of Hormuz, the chokepoint that normally carries around 20 percent of the world’s oil and roughly 45 percent of China’s crude imports. Brent moved above 100 dollars a barrel for the first time in roughly four years, and on 11 March the International Energy Agency authorised its largest ever coordinated release, 400 million barrels from member reserves.<\/p>\n
La Chine, qui ne fait pas partie du syst\u00e8me de l'AIE, a r\u00e9agi de sa propre mani\u00e8re. Au lieu de surench\u00e9rir sur les cargaisons rares \u00e0 des prix exorbitants, elle a cess\u00e9 de remplir ses r\u00e9servoirs et a commenc\u00e9 \u00e0 les vider. Les donn\u00e9es douani\u00e8res montrent que les importations ont chut\u00e9 \u00e0 environ 7,8 millions de barils par jour en mai, contre une moyenne quinquennale d'environ 11 millions, soit le niveau le plus bas depuis pr\u00e8s de dix ans. Cette seule r\u00e9duction a repr\u00e9sent\u00e9 environ 74 % de la baisse du commerce mondial de p\u00e9trole brut pendant la crise.<\/p>\n
The effect surprised forecasters who had priced a far worse spike. By absorbing its own demand shock from storage, China removed the world’s largest buyer from a panicked market at exactly the moment supply was shortest. The stockpile did precisely what it was built to do, and its scale, near 1.4 billion barrels against the government’s own three-month import-cover target, is why Beijing could afford to do it for months rather than weeks.<\/p>\n
Les pr\u00e9visions \u00e9tablies avant la crise d\u00e9crivent toujours la trajectoire que les deux agences anticipent. L'Agence am\u00e9ricaine d'information sur l'\u00e9nergie (EIA) supposait que la Chine continuerait \u00e0 constituer des stocks strat\u00e9giques \u00e0 un rythme proche de 1 million de barils par jour jusqu'en 2026, avant de ralentir en 2027. Le cabinet de conseil FGE pr\u00e9voyait une hausse des stocks d'environ 266 millions de barils sur l'ann\u00e9e, soit environ 730\u00a0000 barils par jour en moyenne. Ces deux pr\u00e9visions laissent entendre que la r\u00e9duction des stocks observ\u00e9e pendant la crise constitue une pause dans un processus d'accumulation \u00e0 plus long terme, et non son aboutissement.<\/p>\n
Le programme d'investissement physique va dans le m\u00eame sens. Les entreprises d'\u00c9tat, dont Sinopec et CNOOC, augmentent leur capacit\u00e9 de stockage d'au moins 169 millions de barils sur 11 sites entre 2025 et 2026. La F\u00e9d\u00e9ration chinoise de l'industrie p\u00e9troli\u00e8re et p\u00e9trochimique s'est engag\u00e9e \u00e0 porter la capacit\u00e9 des r\u00e9serves nationales \u00e0 plus d'un milliard de barils, soit l'\u00e9quivalent de trois mois de couverture nette des importations. Les r\u00e9servoirs vides constituent un signal d'achat permanent.<\/p>\n
Timing is the only real question, and China’s own behaviour supplies the rule: it accelerates purchases when prices are soft and steps back when they spike. A durable reopening of Hormuz and a Brent price returning toward pre-crisis levels would recreate exactly the conditions under which China stockpiled hardest, this time with more tankage to fill and a fresh demonstration of why the buffer is worth holding.<\/p>\n
Comme P\u00e9kin ne publie rien, il faut d\u00e9duire les perspectives pour 2026 \u00e0 partir des flux plut\u00f4t que des d\u00e9clarations officielles. Analyser la situation p\u00e9riode par p\u00e9riode r\u00e9v\u00e8le une coh\u00e9rence\u00a0: une accumulation record tant que les prix le permettaient, une r\u00e9duction d\u00e9lib\u00e9r\u00e9e lorsque ce n\u2019\u00e9tait plus le cas, et des pr\u00e9visions qui anticipent une reprise de cette accumulation une fois la situation normalis\u00e9e.<\/p>\n
Chaque chiffre comporte la mise en garde qui caract\u00e9rise l'ensemble de ces donn\u00e9es\u00a0: il s'agit d'estimations \u00e9tablies \u00e0 partir de donn\u00e9es douani\u00e8res, du suivi des p\u00e9troliers et des mesures satellitaires, et diff\u00e9rentes m\u00e9thodologies produisent des r\u00e9sultats diff\u00e9rents. L'orientation de chaque phase, en revanche, ne fait aucun doute.<\/p>\n
| P\u00e9riode<\/th>\n | D\u00e9bit estim\u00e9<\/th>\n | Ce que cela signifie<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<\/thead>\n |
|---|---|---|
| ann\u00e9e compl\u00e8te 2025<\/td>\n | Constructions d'une capacit\u00e9 moyenne d'environ 1,1 million de barils par jour<\/td>\n | Niveau de r\u00e9f\u00e9rence record ; les stocks totaux atteignent pr\u00e8s de 1,4 milliard de barils<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| Janvier \u00e0 f\u00e9vrier 2026<\/td>\n | Production d'environ 1,24 million de barils par jour<\/td>\n | Acc\u00e9l\u00e9ration sup\u00e9rieure \u00e0 la moyenne de 2025 tandis que les prix restaient attractifs<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| Mars \u00e0 mai 2026<\/td>\n | Les importations ont \u00e9t\u00e9 r\u00e9duites \u00e0 environ 7,8 millions de barils par jour ; le pr\u00e9l\u00e8vement net est en baisse.<\/td>\n | R\u00e9ponse \u00e0 la crise : consommer les stocks plut\u00f4t que d'acheter sur un march\u00e9 en flamb\u00e9e.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| Seconde moiti\u00e9 de 2026 (pr\u00e9visions)<\/td>\n | Des augmentations de production d'environ 0,7 \u00e0 1 million de barils par jour sont attendues.<\/td>\n | L'EIA et la FGE pr\u00e9voient toutes deux une reprise de l'accumulation \u00e0 mesure que les prix se normalisent.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n |
| Programme de renforcement des capacit\u00e9s<\/td>\n | 169 millions de barils de nouvelles capacit\u00e9s de stockage r\u00e9parties sur 11 sites<\/td>\n | L'objectif de l'\u00c9tat, fix\u00e9 \u00e0 plus d'un milliard de barils de capacit\u00e9 de r\u00e9serve, permet de poursuivre le d\u00e9veloppement des capacit\u00e9s de production.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\nLe signal commercial \u00e0 l'int\u00e9rieur de la pause<\/h2>\nLa principale distinction commerciale dans cette affaire r\u00e9side entre le taux de remplissage et le programme de capacit\u00e9. Le taux de remplissage est index\u00e9 sur le prix du p\u00e9trole et s'est stabilis\u00e9 en mars. Le programme de capacit\u00e9, qui comprend les travaux de g\u00e9nie civil, la construction des r\u00e9servoirs en acier, les raccordements aux pipelines, le comptage, l'instrumentation, la protection incendie, l'inspection et la certification sur 11 sites, est r\u00e9gi par les cycles de planification de l'\u00c9tat et s'est poursuivi sans interruption. Les fournisseurs qui participent \u00e0 ce d\u00e9veloppement vendent dans le cadre du programme, et non en fonction du prix.<\/p>\n The cycle also moves adjacent markets in both directions. China’s stockpiling swings are now large enough to reshape seaborne crude flows, tanker demand and port throughput on their own: the 2025 build pulled shipping demand forward, and the 2026 drawdown removed it just as sharply. Any supplier whose revenue tracks Chinese import volumes, from marine logistics to inspection services, is exposed to a reserve policy that is decided without publication and read only through flows.<\/p>\n Pour les \u00e9quipes marketing et strat\u00e9gie du secteur de l'\u00e9nergie, cet \u00e9pisode est aussi une le\u00e7on pr\u00e9cieuse en mati\u00e8re d'analyse de la demande. Les acheteurs et les analystes se posent des questions essentielles\u00a0: quelle est la part de la Chine dans la production \u00e9nerg\u00e9tique\u00a0? Est-elle \u00e0 l'arr\u00eat\u00a0? Quand reprendra-t-elle\u00a0? La demande conna\u00eet-elle des pics pr\u00e9cis\u00e9ment au moment o\u00f9 le march\u00e9 est le plus incertain\u00a0? Les entreprises qui r\u00e9pondent de mani\u00e8re cr\u00e9dible \u00e0 ces questions captent l'attention. C'est la raison d'\u00eatre de cette page, et cette m\u00eame logique de r\u00e9ponse s'applique \u00e0 toute marque B2B du secteur de l'\u00e9nergie dont l'expertise correspond aux questions que se pose activement le march\u00e9.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" La Chine a entam\u00e9 l'ann\u00e9e 2026 avec une augmentation estim\u00e9e \u00e0 1,24 million de barils par jour de ses r\u00e9serves p\u00e9troli\u00e8res. La crise du d\u00e9sert d'Ormuz a alors boulevers\u00e9 son mod\u00e8le \u00e9conomique, le transformant de constructeur en amortisseur\u00a0: les importations ont chut\u00e9 \u00e0 7,8 millions de barils par jour et la Chine a puis\u00e9 dans ses r\u00e9serves de 1,4 milliard de barils au lieu de compenser la hausse soudaine de la demande. Que r\u00e9v\u00e8lent ces flux et quand la construction de nouvelles r\u00e9serves reprendra-t-elle\u00a0?.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"iawp_total_views":2,"p54_article_data":"{\"meta\":{\"kicker\":\"Insight \u00b7 Energy\",\"topics\":[\"Energy\",\"Strategy\",\"Capital\"],\"title\":\"Is China Still Adding to Its Oil Reserves in 2026? The Record Build, the Hormuz Shock, and What Comes Next\",\"dek\":\"China entered 2026 stockpiling crude faster than ever, adding an estimated 1.24 million barrels a day to inventories in the opening weeks of the year, above even 2025's record average of 1.1 million barrels a day. Then the Strait of Hormuz disruption turned the world's biggest oil buyer into its biggest shock absorber: imports fell to roughly 7.8 million barrels a day by May, the lowest in nearly a decade, and China drew on its estimated 1.4 billion barrel stockpile rather than chase a spiking market. Here is what the trade data show, why the pause is not the end of the buildout, and what the stockpiling cycle signals for suppliers watching the world's largest storage programme.\",\"date\":\"3 July 2026\",\"readTime\":\"9 min read\",\"author\":\"Project 54\",\"listenTime\":\"21 min listen\"},\"quickAnswer\":{\"q\":\"Is China still adding to its oil reserves in 2026?\",\"a\":\"Yes at the start of the year, at record pace, then deliberately not. Preliminary trade data show China adding about 1.24 million barrels a day to crude inventories in early 2026, above the roughly 1.1 million barrels a day averaged across 2025, which left total stocks near 1.4 billion barrels. The Strait of Hormuz disruption from late February changed the flow: with Brent spiking above 100 dollars a barrel, China cut imports to about 7.8 million barrels a day by May, its lowest in nearly a decade, and drew on stockpiles instead of buying the spike. Pre-crisis forecasts from the EIA, about 1.0 million barrels a day of builds, and FGE, about 730,000 barrels a day, still frame the full-year picture: the storage buildout continues, and accumulation is expected to resume as prices normalise.\"},\"takeaways\":[\"China opened 2026 stockpiling faster than ever: preliminary data show additions of about 1.24 million barrels a day in the opening weeks, above 2025's record average of about 1.1 million barrels a day, which had already lifted total crude inventories to nearly 1.4 billion barrels.\",\"The Strait of Hormuz disruption flipped China from builder to buffer. Imports fell to about 7.8 million barrels a day by May 2026, the lowest in nearly a decade, and China's cut accounted for roughly 74 percent of the decrease in global crude trade.\",\"The drawdown is the reserve working as designed. By consuming from storage instead of bidding for scarce cargoes at over 100 dollars a barrel, China absorbed the shock and helped keep the global price spike contained.\",\"The buildout logic survives the pause. Pre-crisis forecasts saw 2026 builds of 0.7 to 1.0 million barrels a day, and the capacity programme, at least 169 million barrels of new tankage across 11 sites and a state target above 1 billion barrels, remains in place.\",\"For suppliers, the fill rate and the capacity programme are different markets. Tankage, instrumentation, inspection and marine logistics contracts run on the storage buildout, not the oil price, and the buildout has not stopped.\"],\"sections\":[{\"id\":\"record-build\",\"q\":\"How fast was China adding oil to its reserves before the crisis?\",\"h\":\"Record accumulation into early 2026\",\"p\":[\"Through 2025 China added crude oil to its combined strategic and commercial inventories at an average of about 1.1 million barrels a day, the fastest sustained accumulation any country has ever run. By December 2025 total stocks stood near 1.4 billion barrels: roughly 360 million barrels in the directly government-controlled strategic reserve and around 1 billion barrels in commercial tanks that Beijing increasingly treats as strategic, having directed its national oil companies to hold emergency barrels.\",\"The new year began faster still. Preliminary trade and government data for early 2026 indicate additions of about 1.24 million barrels a day, below the record monthly pace set in December but above the full-year 2025 average. The logic was straightforward: prices entering 2026 remained in a range Beijing considered attractive, new tankage was coming online across the state programme, and the political instruction to stockpile had not changed.\",\"None of this is officially published. Beijing releases no reserve statistics, so every figure here is an estimate assembled from customs data, satellite tank-gauging and refinery runs, the same triangulation that produces the range of numbers explored across our companion dossiers on the stockpile's size and days of cover.\"]},{\"id\":\"hormuz-flip\",\"q\":\"What did the Strait of Hormuz disruption change?\",\"h\":\"From builder to buffer: the flip in the second quarter\",\"p\":[\"From late February 2026 the conflict in the Middle East largely closed the Strait of Hormuz, the chokepoint that normally carries around 20 percent of the world's oil and roughly 45 percent of China's crude imports. Brent moved above 100 dollars a barrel for the first time in roughly four years, and on 11 March the International Energy Agency authorised its largest ever coordinated release, 400 million barrels from member reserves.\",\"China, which sits outside the IEA system, ran its own response. Rather than bid for scarce cargoes at crisis prices, it stopped filling tanks and started emptying them. Customs data show imports falling to about 7.8 million barrels a day by May, against a five-year average around 11 million, the lowest level in nearly a decade. That single cut accounted for roughly 74 percent of the decrease in global crude trade during the crisis.\",\"The effect surprised forecasters who had priced a far worse spike. By absorbing its own demand shock from storage, China removed the world's largest buyer from a panicked market at exactly the moment supply was shortest. The stockpile did precisely what it was built to do, and its scale, near 1.4 billion barrels against the government's own three-month import-cover target, is why Beijing could afford to do it for months rather than weeks.\"]},{\"id\":\"resumption\",\"q\":\"Will China resume stockpiling in the second half of 2026?\",\"h\":\"The forecasts, and the logic that survives the shock\",\"p\":[\"The forecasts made before the crisis still describe the trajectory both agencies expect to reassert itself. The US Energy Information Administration assumed China would keep building strategic stockpiles at close to 1.0 million barrels a day through 2026 before slowing in 2027. Consultancy FGE projected inventories rising by about 266 million barrels across the year, roughly 730,000 barrels a day on average. Both imply that the crisis drawdown is a pause inside a longer accumulation, not the end of it.\",\"The physical programme points the same way. State companies including Sinopec and CNOOC are adding at least 169 million barrels of storage capacity across 11 sites through 2025 and 2026, and the China Petroleum and Petrochemical Industry Federation has set an intention to lift state reserve capacity above 1 billion barrels, explicitly framed as three months of net import cover. Empty tanks are a standing instruction to buy.\",\"Timing is the only real question, and China's own behaviour supplies the rule: it accelerates purchases when prices are soft and steps back when they spike. A durable reopening of Hormuz and a Brent price returning toward pre-crisis levels would recreate exactly the conditions under which China stockpiled hardest, this time with more tankage to fill and a fresh demonstration of why the buffer is worth holding.\"]},{\"id\":\"ledger\",\"q\":\"How do the 2026 numbers fit together?\",\"h\":\"The stockpiling ledger, period by period\",\"p\":[\"Because Beijing publishes nothing, the 2026 story has to be read from flows rather than statements. Laid out period by period, the pattern is coherent: a record build while prices allowed it, a deliberate drawdown when they did not, and forecasts that expect the build to resume once conditions normalise.\",\"Every figure carries the caveat that runs through this whole cluster: these are estimates built from customs data, tanker tracking and satellite gauging, and different methodologies produce different numbers. The direction of each phase, however, is not in dispute.\"],\"table\":{\"cols\":[\"Period\",\"Estimated flow\",\"What it signals\"],\"rows\":[[\"2025 full year\",\"Builds averaging about 1.1 million b\/d\",\"The record baseline; total stocks reach nearly 1.4 billion barrels\"],[\"January to February 2026\",\"Builds around 1.24 million b\/d\",\"Acceleration above the 2025 average while prices stayed attractive\"],[\"March to May 2026\",\"Imports cut to about 7.8 million b\/d; net drawdown\",\"Crisis response: consume from storage rather than buy a spiking market\"],[\"Second half 2026 (forecast)\",\"Builds of roughly 0.7 to 1.0 million b\/d expected\",\"EIA and FGE both expect accumulation to resume as prices normalise\"],[\"Capacity programme\",\"169 million barrels of new tankage across 11 sites\",\"State target above 1 billion barrels of reserve capacity keeps the buildout running\"]]}},{\"id\":\"commercial-signal\",\"q\":\"What does the stockpiling cycle mean for suppliers and marketers?\",\"h\":\"The commercial signal inside the pause\",\"p\":[\"The most important commercial distinction in this story is between the fill rate and the capacity programme. The fill rate moves with the oil price and stopped moving in March. The capacity programme, the civil works, steel tankage, pipeline tie-ins, metering, instrumentation, fire suppression, inspection and certification across 11 sites, runs on state planning cycles and did not stop. Suppliers selling into the buildout are selling into the programme, not the price.\",\"The cycle also moves adjacent markets in both directions. China's stockpiling swings are now large enough to reshape seaborne crude flows, tanker demand and port throughput on their own: the 2025 build pulled shipping demand forward, and the 2026 drawdown removed it just as sharply. Any supplier whose revenue tracks Chinese import volumes, from marine logistics to inspection services, is exposed to a reserve policy that is decided without publication and read only through flows.\",\"For marketing and strategy teams in the energy sector, the episode is also a demand-intelligence lesson. The questions buyers and analysts ask, how much is China adding, has it stopped, when will it resume, spike exactly when the market is most uncertain, and the organisations that answer them credibly capture that attention. That is the reason this page exists, and the same answer-engine logic applies to any energy B2B brand whose expertise maps to questions the market is actively asking.\"]}],\"media\":{\"image\":{\"src\":\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/lighthouse-coastal-energy.jpg\",\"label\":\"China's storage buildout kept running through the 2026 price shock: the fill rate paused, the capacity programme did not.\",\"credit\":\"Project 54\"},\"infographicLabel\":\"China's 2026 stockpiling cycle: record builds in January and February, crisis drawdown from March, forecast resumption in the second half\",\"pdf\":{\"href\":\"\/wp-content\/themes\/p54-blueprint\/assets\/pdf\/is-china-still-stockpiling-oil-2026.pdf\",\"title\":\"China's 2026 Oil Stockpiling Cycle: Briefing Deck\",\"meta\":\"9-slide briefing \u00b7 Project 54\"},\"podcast\":{\"src\":\"\/wp-content\/themes\/p54-blueprint\/assets\/media\/is-china-still-stockpiling-oil-2026-podcast.m4a\",\"title\":\"China's Invisible Oil Buffer Dictates Global Flows\",\"ep\":\"P54 Energy Growth Brief\",\"duration\":\"20:54\"}},\"poll\":{\"q\":\"China stockpiled at record pace, then drew down through the Hormuz crisis. What does the cycle tell you?\",\"note\":\"Your selection maps how you interpret China's reserve behaviour. No vote tallies, this is a reflection tool.\",\"options\":[{\"id\":\"a\",\"label\":\"A buffer working exactly as designed\",\"insight\":\"This reading treats the 2026 cycle as vindication: the point of holding 1.4 billion barrels is to consume them in a crisis instead of bidding against the world for scarce cargoes. Build cheap, draw dear, repeat.\"},{\"id\":\"b\",\"label\":\"A price actor now too big to ignore\",\"insight\":\"On this view the lesson is market power. When one buyer's stockpiling decisions account for three quarters of the swing in global crude trade, China's reserve policy has become a supply-side force comparable to an OPEC decision, set without publication or warning.\"},{\"id\":\"c\",\"label\":\"A cycle you can position for\",\"insight\":\"This reading is commercial. The drawdown is temporary, the tankage keeps growing, and the resumption of buying is forecastable within a range. Suppliers and traders who track the flows rather than the headlines get to the demand first.\"}]},\"faq\":[{\"q\":\"How much oil was China adding per day in early 2026?\",\"a\":\"Preliminary data indicate about 1.24 million barrels a day of additions in January and February 2026, above the roughly 1.1 million barrels a day averaged across 2025. The full context of the reserve programme is set out in our dossier on China's strategic petroleum reserve in 2026<\/a>.\"},{\"q\":\"Did China stop stockpiling during the Hormuz crisis?\",\"a\":\"Effectively yes. Customs data show imports falling to about 7.8 million barrels a day by May 2026, the lowest in nearly a decade, implying China was consuming from storage rather than adding to it. Beijing publishes no reserve data, so the switch is read from trade flows rather than official statements.\"},{\"q\":\"How big is China's total oil stockpile?\",\"a\":\"Best estimates put total crude inventories near 1.4 billion barrels entering 2026, roughly 360 million barrels in the government strategic reserve and around 1 billion barrels in commercial tanks. How that count is built is covered in our dossier on the barrel count<\/a>.\"},{\"q\":\"How many days of supply does the stockpile cover?\",\"a\":\"Around 120 to 130 days of import cover on most estimates, though the figure moves with the import denominator used. The methodology and the ranges are unpacked in our days-of-supply dossier<\/a>.\"},{\"q\":\"Does China's stockpiling follow IEA rules?\",\"a\":\"No. China is not an IEA member and carries no 90-day stockholding obligation, and it did not release stocks through the IEA's coordinated March 2026 action. How China compares to the benchmark anyway is examined in our dossier on the 90-day comparison<\/a>.\"}],\"newsletter\":{\"kicker\":\"The Energy Growth Brief\",\"title\":[\"Get the next\",\"intelligence drop\"],\"body\":\"Join energy and industrial leaders getting our marketing, AI-growth and revenue-architecture intelligence, direct, no filler.\",\"cadence\":\"Twice monthly\",\"reach\":\"Gulf \u00b7 MENA \u00b7 Asia \u00b7 Europe\",\"cta\":\"Subscribe\",\"note\":\"No spam. Unsubscribe anytime. We read every reply.\",\"success\":\"You're on the list\",\"successBody\":\"Welcome to The Energy Growth Brief, watch your inbox for the next dispatch.\"},\"related\":[{\"title\":\"China's Strategic Petroleum Reserve in 2026: Levels, Capacity, Days of Supply, and the Commercial Signal\",\"topic\":\"Energy\",\"href\":\"https:\/\/projectfifty4.com\/china-strategic-petroleum-reserve-2026\/\"},{\"title\":\"How Many Barrels Are in China's Strategic Petroleum Reserve? Sizing the World's Largest Oil Stockpile\",\"topic\":\"Energy\",\"href\":\"https:\/\/projectfifty4.com\/china-strategic-petroleum-reserve-barrels\/\"},{\"title\":\"How Does China Compare to the IEA 90-Day Benchmark? Why the Comparison Is Harder Than It Looks\",\"topic\":\"Energy\",\"href\":\"https:\/\/projectfifty4.com\/china-iea-90-day-oil-stockholding-benchmark\/\"}]}","p54_faq":"","p54_media":"","p54_comments_enabled":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[92,125],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3560","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-analysis","category-strategy"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/projectfifty4.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3560","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/projectfifty4.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/projectfifty4.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projectfifty4.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projectfifty4.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3560"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/projectfifty4.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3560\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3562,"href":"https:\/\/projectfifty4.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3560\/revisions\/3562"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/projectfifty4.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3560"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projectfifty4.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3560"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/projectfifty4.com\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3560"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}} |