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What the EIA Weekly Petroleum Status Report Includes and How to Read It

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The U.S. Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) Weekly Petroleum Status Report (WPSR) is a weekly estimate of how crude oil and refined petroleum products move through the U.S. system. It combines production, refinery activity, imports, exports, inventories and a measure called product supplied, which approximately represents consumption. Start with Table 1 for the national balance, then use the regional stock, refinery and trade tables to explain why the balance changed.

What the WPSR measures

EIA describes the WPSR as its most comprehensive weekly view of U.S. crude-oil and refined-product balances. It covers crude oil and major products including motor gasoline, distillate fuel oil, jet fuel, residual fuel oil and propane. The report is designed to provide timely information on physical petroleum markets, not to serve as a direct census of every end-user transaction.

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Each release combines estimates from refineries, fractionators, gas-processing plants, bulk terminals, product pipelines, crude-oil stock holders, importers, blenders and fuel-ethanol facilities. Because the figures come from multiple reporting points and are assembled quickly, a single week can contain timing effects, estimation error and later revisions.

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The WPSR is therefore best understood as a system-level accounting snapshot. It follows material entering primary U.S. petroleum channels, being processed, held in storage, shipped abroad or disappearing from those channels. That scope makes it useful for monitoring physical supply, but it also explains why the report cannot answer every retail-demand question. A gasoline station sale, for example, is not recorded as an individual transaction in the weekly balance.

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What is published

The WPSR landing page normally provides a summary, a data overview, downloadable CSV, XLS, JSON and PDF files, and links to individual tables. The live table list can change when EIA moves, revises or discontinues a series, so check the current page before building an automated workflow.

Table Main use
Table 1 U.S. Petroleum Balance Sheet: national production, refinery inputs, stock changes, trade and product supplied.
Table 2 Inputs and production by Petroleum Administration for Defense (PAD) District.
Table 3 Refiner and blender net production.
Table 4 Crude-oil stocks by PAD District and U.S. totals for petroleum products.
Table 5 Total motor-gasoline and fuel-ethanol stocks by PAD District.
Table 5A Gasoline and ethanol stocks with total gasoline broken out by sub-PADD.
Table 6 Stocks of distillate, kerosene-type jet fuel, residual fuel oil and propane/propylene by PAD District.
Table 7 Imports and exports of crude oil and petroleum products.
Table 8 Preliminary crude-oil imports by country of origin.
Table 9 Weekly U.S. and PAD District estimates useful for charting and regional analysis.

Price tables may include spot prices and, where still published, retail or futures series. Some price tables have been discontinued or moved to related products, so do not assume that an older table number still exists.

Table numbers are navigation aids, not a guarantee that a series has remained unchanged. A revised title, footnote or methodology notice can alter how a column should be interpreted. Save the table heading and notes with any downloaded series so a later reader can identify the exact definition you used.

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A practical way to read a release

  1. Confirm the dates. Record the week-ending date separately from the release date. A Wednesday release generally describes the prior week, and comparing release dates instead of week-ending dates can misalign your analysis.
  2. Read the Summary and Data Overview. Note the principal changes, units, coverage and any notices about methodology, revisions or table availability.
  3. Start with Table 1. Treat it as the national accounting frame. Identify supply inputs, disposition items, stock change and product supplied before looking for a market narrative.
  4. Open Tables 2 and 3. Check refinery inputs, regional activity and net production by PAD District. A national inventory move may be caused by a regional outage or by a shift in refinery operations.
  5. Use Tables 4–6 for inventories. Select the product and geography that match your question: crude, gasoline, ethanol, distillate, jet fuel, residual fuel or propane.
  6. Use Tables 7 and 8 for trade. Table 7 gives import and export flows; Table 8 adds preliminary crude-import origin data. Trade can be volatile because the cargo and reporting dates do not always coincide.
  7. Use Table 9 and downloads for repeatable analysis. The weekly U.S. and PAD District estimates and machine-readable files are better suited to charts, spreadsheets and scripts than copying values from a PDF.
  8. Check definitions and notes. Read the Methodology, Sources, Glossary and explanatory notes whenever a move is unusual or a term is ambiguous.

For a quick market briefing, this sequence prevents a common mistake: starting with a dramatic inventory headline and only later discovering that the change reflected a refinery outage, a delayed cargo or a definitional difference. For a recurring dashboard, make the same sequence part of the data pipeline: identify the release, capture the metadata, load the series, then apply the interpretation.

How to read the national balance sheet

Table 1 is most useful when you ask what changed on both sides of the balance, rather than treating one headline number as the whole story. Supply-side entries include domestic production, refinery production and imports. Disposition-side entries include refinery inputs, exports, stock changes and product supplied. The accounting identity is affected by adjustments and losses, and EIA warns that independently rounded components may not add exactly to the displayed total.

Separate a level from a flow. An inventory level is the amount reported in storage at the end of the period. Production, refinery inputs, imports, exports and product supplied are flows, often shown as daily rates or weekly quantities. A flow can be high while the associated stock level falls if withdrawals and exports exceed additions. Always read the column heading and footnote before calculating a percentage change.

Product supplied: the consumption proxy

“Product supplied” approximately represents consumption because it measures the disappearance of petroleum from primary sources. In general terms, the calculation starts with field production, refinery production, imports and applicable adjustments, then subtracts stock change, crude losses, refinery inputs and exports. It is not a survey of gasoline pumped into vehicles or fuel delivered to every final customer.

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Use product supplied to study apparent demand trends, especially when comparing the same product and geography over several weeks. Explain that it is an accounting estimate and avoid presenting it as a precise measure of end-user sales. It can move because of inventory positioning, trade timing or changes in primary-source reporting even when drivers’ behavior has not changed by the same amount.

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Stocks: inventory levels and changes

Stocks are petroleum inventories held for future use. A build means reported inventories increased over the period; a draw means they decreased. The level tells you how much material is reported in storage, while the weekly change tells you the direction and size of the latest movement. Neither measure alone proves that the market is oversupplied or tight.

Interpret a stock change alongside refinery inputs, production, imports, exports and product supplied. For example, a gasoline draw can reflect strong apparent demand, lower refinery output, weaker imports, higher exports or a combination of those factors. A crude build can occur while product stocks fall if refineries increase runs and convert more crude into gasoline or distillate.

Refinery input, production and yield are different

  • Refinery input is the crude oil and raw or intermediate material processed by refineries.
  • Refinery production is the petroleum product produced at a refinery or blending plant.
  • Refinery yield is the percentage of finished product obtained from crude-oil input and net unfinished-oil input.

Do not substitute one for another. A refinery can process a large volume of crude while producing a different product mix, and a change in yield does not necessarily mean that total refinery input changed by the same amount. Inputs describe what went into the process; production describes what came out; yield relates output composition to the specified input base.

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Finding gasoline, crude and other inventories

Crude oil

Use Table 4 for U.S. crude stocks and PAD District detail. The regional figures matter because a comfortable national total can coexist with a constrained local market. Compare the relevant district with refinery inputs and nearby trade flows before drawing a conclusion about availability.

Motor gasoline and ethanol

Table 5 reports total motor-gasoline and fuel-ethanol stocks by PAD District. Table 5A adds sub-PADD detail for total gasoline. This distinction is important when a national gasoline number masks a shortage or surplus in a particular refining and distribution region. Ethanol is shown alongside gasoline stocks, so do not treat the ethanol column as another measure of finished gasoline volume.

Distillate, jet fuel, residual fuel and propane

Table 6 contains stocks for distillate fuel, kerosene-type jet fuel, residual fuel oil and propane/propylene by PAD District. Choose the product definition carefully: “distillate” is a category, while a narrower question about diesel or heating oil may require the specific series and explanatory notes. Jet fuel in this table is kerosene-type, and propane/propylene is not interchangeable with a household propane-sales estimate.

PAD Districts and regional interpretation

PAD Districts are EIA’s regional reporting areas. They were created for petroleum logistics and emergency planning, not as a simple map of state-by-state demand. National totals can conceal regional tightness, refinery outages, pipeline constraints or unusual imports.

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When the question is regional, match the same PAD District across the input, production and stock tables. For instance, use Table 2 to see refinery inputs, Table 3 for net production and Tables 4–6 for the applicable inventory. A national stock draw is more informative when you can identify whether it was concentrated in one district or spread across several.

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Do not add regional observations to a national conclusion without checking coverage. A sub-PADD gasoline series, a PAD District refinery input and a U.S.-total product-supplied figure use different geographic scopes. The comparison is valid only after the product, unit, period and geography are aligned.

Imports, exports and country-of-origin data

EIA defines imports as receipts into the 50 states and the District of Columbia from foreign countries, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands and other U.S. possessions and territories. Exports are shipments from those jurisdictions to the same destinations. The standard petroleum conversion is 42 U.S. gallons per barrel.

Table 7 provides aggregate import and export flows for crude and products. Table 8 provides preliminary crude-import volumes by country of origin. “Preliminary” matters: early country-level figures can be revised as reporting is completed.

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Do not interpret a one-week trade spike as a permanent change in supply. Cargo arrivals, customs records and reporting cutoffs can place a shipment in a different week from the one in which it was loaded or contracted. A low import week may be followed by a high week when a delayed cargo is recorded; the two weeks should be read together rather than as separate structural shocks.

How reliable is a one-week change?

A WPSR week is useful for timely monitoring, but it is noisy. EIA specifically notes that imports and exports can vary significantly week to week and recommends four-week moving averages for those series because of timing issues and reporting practices. In an August 10, 2022 Today in Energy explanation, EIA called the WPSR its most comprehensive weekly balance source and highlighted four-week averages as particularly useful for volatile trade data.

That recommendation does not make the four-week average a replacement for the weekly observation. The single week can identify a sudden outage or cargo arrival; the average helps determine whether the event changed the underlying trend. Present both when the audience needs to understand timing and direction.

A repeatable comparison checklist

  • Compare the same product definition, not a broad category with a narrow one.
  • Use the same unit, such as thousand barrels per day or million barrels, and verify whether a value is a level, a rate or a change.
  • Match the geography: U.S. total, PAD District or sub-PADD.
  • Use the same week-ending convention.
  • Distinguish the inventory level from the week-over-week stock change.
  • Read the four-week average beside the single-week estimate when assessing trade.
  • Check refinery inputs, production, exports and product supplied before assigning a cause to a stock move.
  • Review notices, methodology and explanatory notes for revisions or definitional changes.

When to use longer comparisons

For a trend, compare several weekly observations, the four-week average and a like-for-like period such as the same week in a prior year. Seasonal refinery maintenance, driving demand, heating demand and hurricane disruptions can make adjacent weeks poor substitutes for one another. Keep the week-ending date in every chart label so a reader can distinguish a seasonal comparison from a sequential-week comparison.

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Units, rounding and downloaded data

Read the table heading and footnotes before calculating a change. Some series are reported as daily rates, while others are inventories or weekly totals. Convert only after confirming the unit and time basis. EIA notes that totals may not equal the sum of displayed components because values are rounded independently; a small mismatch is therefore not automatically an error.

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For analysis, download the CSV, XLS or JSON file associated with the current release and retain the release date, week-ending date, table name and series description in your data set. PDFs are convenient for a human-readable snapshot but are less reliable for automated extraction. Preserve missing-value markers and footnotes rather than converting them silently to zero.

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Common mistakes and how to avoid them

Calling product supplied “sales”

It is an estimate of disappearance from primary sources, not a register of retail transactions. Use “approximately represents consumption” in an explanation of the measure.

Reading a stock draw as proof of strong demand

A draw can result from lower production, fewer imports, higher exports or inventory reclassification as well as demand. Check the associated balance-sheet entries.

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Mixing national and regional figures

Do not compare a U.S.-total gasoline stock with a single PAD District refinery input and call the difference a national imbalance. Keep product, geography and time basis aligned.

Overreacting to one trade week

Use the four-week average and inspect the week-ending dates. A cargo-timing effect can reverse in the following release without any structural change in supply.

Assuming an old table list is still current

EIA can move or discontinue tables, particularly price series. Use the live report page and its Data Overview rather than relying on a saved table number from an older article.

Treating preliminary origin data as final

Country-of-origin figures in Table 8 are preliminary. Label them accordingly, and expect later releases to revise early values as reporting is completed.

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A compact workflow for analysts

  1. Save the release and record its release and week-ending dates.
  2. Read the summary for notices and headline changes.
  3. Extract Table 1 and classify each movement as supply, disposition or stock change.
  4. Use Tables 2 and 3 to test whether refinery activity explains the national move.
  5. Use Tables 4–6 to locate the product and region responsible for an inventory change.
  6. Use Tables 7 and 8 to check whether trade timing or origin changed.
  7. Calculate a four-week average for volatile import and export series.
  8. Re-read the glossary and methodology before publishing a chart or narrative.

For a durable series, store the raw file unchanged and create a separate analysis table with standardized names. Record whether each observation is a level, rate, total or change. This simple audit trail makes it easier to explain a revision or reproduce a chart after EIA updates a table.

Bottom line for interpreting the WPSR

The WPSR is the fastest broad snapshot of U.S. petroleum supply and disposition, but it is an estimate rather than a direct consumption census. Table 1 gives the accounting frame; Tables 4–6 answer most inventory questions; Tables 7–8 explain trade; and Table 9 supports systematic weekly and regional analysis. The most defensible interpretation combines the stock move with refinery activity, product supplied and trade, then checks the four-week trend and EIA’s notes before treating a single week as a lasting signal.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is in the EIA Weekly Petroleum Status Report?

It is a weekly estimate of U.S. crude and refined-product supply and disposition, including production, refinery inputs and production, imports, exports, inventories and product supplied. It covers motor gasoline, distillate fuel oil, jet fuel, residual fuel oil and propane, with national and PAD District detail.

Where do I find gasoline stocks?

Use Table 5 for total motor-gasoline and fuel-ethanol stocks by PAD District. Table 5A adds sub-PADD detail for total gasoline.

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Where do I find crude inventories and refinery utilization information?

Table 4 provides crude-oil stocks by PAD District and U.S. product totals. Tables 2 and 3 provide refinery inputs, regional activity and refiner and blender net production; read the headings and notes for the exact utilization-related measure.

What does product supplied mean?

EIA says product supplied approximately represents consumption because it measures petroleum’s disappearance from primary sources. It is an accounting estimate, not a direct count of retail sales or end-user deliveries.

Is a one-week inventory draw proof that demand was strong?

No. A draw can reflect stronger apparent demand, lower refinery output, fewer imports, higher exports or several factors together. Compare the full balance sheet and the four-week trend.

How should I read a sudden import or export spike?

Check the week-ending date, cargo and reporting timing, and the four-week moving average. EIA notes that trade series can vary sharply from week to week because of timing and reporting practices.

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What is the difference between refinery input, production and yield?

Input is the crude and other material processed; production is the petroleum product made at a refinery or blending plant; yield is the percentage of finished product obtained from the specified crude and net unfinished-oil input.

Why do WPSR components sometimes not add exactly?

EIA rounds displayed components independently, so a small difference between a displayed total and the sum of displayed parts does not automatically indicate an error.

The Bottom Line

Read Table 1 first, then explain its stock changes with refinery activity, regional inventories and trade. Treat product supplied as an accounting proxy, use four-week averages for volatile imports and exports, and verify definitions, units, dates and notes before making a one-week claim.

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