Over 100 employees leave US EIA, putting crucial energy data at risk, sources say

Audio By Carbonatix

By Arathy Somasekhar and Stephanie Kelly

HOUSTON (Reuters) -The U.S. government’s energy statistics arm is set to lose over 100 employees after the Trump administration’s latest round of resignation offers, putting at risk some of the most closely watched energy reports globally, three sources told Reuters.

The U.S. Energy Information Administration publishes weekly, monthly and annual data on oil and gas output, crude and fuel inventories, and price forecasts, all used by traders and energy companies as indicators of supply and demand. The reports often move global oil prices.

Two sources said the number of people that had left or had accepted buyouts were about 40% of EIA’s roughly 350 employees. One of the sources told Reuters that as many as one-third, while other sources, including three employees of the EIA, said the departures amounted to dozens.

The agency was assessing what reports it will be able to continue releasing and what it might have to stop, two sources said.

The EIA did not respond to a request for comment.

The agency has discussed changing release schedules, one source said. The source attributed the recent change in publishing the gasoline and diesel fuel update on Tuesday mornings, instead of Monday afternoon, to staffing challenges.

Many research initiatives, including working papers and longer-form white papers, have been put on indefinite hold due to staffing, while regular reports may be modified or shortened, another source said.

“As far as continuing publication, it’s hard to say. I can’t envision how, over time, they’ll continue,” one of the sources said about the weekly energy data.

New project developments at the EIA have been put on hold or delayed, three of the sources said, without specifying what those projects involved.

Analysts expressed concern about the potential loss of independent data from the agency. [EIA/S]

“The EIA data contributed greatly to price discovery and it leveled the playing field. It would be very damaging to not have that data,” said John Kilduff, a partner with Again Capital. He has looked at the EIA’s data weekly and used it as an input for every model over more than 20 years.

The departures at EIA come as more than 2,600 Department of Energy staffers have opted to take resignation offers, with offices on power grid stability and loans for high-tech energy projects hit hard.

The DOE is conducting a department-wide review of its organizational structures, a DOE spokesperson said in response to a request for comment for this article.

“No final decisions have been made and multiple plans are still being considered,” the spokesperson said.

The EIA is perhaps the only government agency in the world to report such detailed statistics on a frequent basis, so market participants closely track its publications to inform trading decisions.

It also puts out smaller write-ups for the general public, narrating trends in the energy sector and helping break down jargon. Industry analysts use EIA data to build their own models and or to corroborate their models.

The agency’s data, analyses, and forecasts are independent of approval by any other officer or employee of the U.S. government by law, according to its website, freeing it from bias.

“This is information that will be closely held by companies that I don’t think would be necessarily shared with the industry,” Kilduff said.

(Reporting by Arathy Somasekhar in Houston, Stephanie Kelly in New York, Valerie Volcovici in Washington D.C.; Editing by Lincoln Feast and Sonali Paul.)