U.S. says oil reserve ready to offset pipeline blast

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Energy Department said on Thursday it was prepared to make oil supplies from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve available to refineries to help offset the disruption in Canadian oil imports caused by an explosion at the Enbridge pipeline.

"Crude oil from the nation's Strategic Petroleum Reserve is available to alleviate a severe supply disruption and remains available if necessary," a department spokeswoman told Reuters.

She said the department is "reaching out" to Midwest refineries to assess their supply situation and see if they need oil from the emergency stockpile.

"The DOE is currently reaching out to refineries in the Midwest and Enbridge officials and others within the federal government to further assess the situation and offer assistance," the spokeswoman said.

She pointed out that the explosion occurred at one of the four Enbridge pipelines that was undergoing maintenance, and a second pipeline has shut as precautionary measure.

However, the other two pipelines are currently moving more than 650,000 barrels of Canadian crude oil a day to the U.S. market, down from the four pipelines' normal combined rate of 1.1 million barrels a day, the spokeswoman said.

(Reporting by Tom Doggett, editing by Matthew Lewis)