President George W. Bush triggered the biggest one-day jump in oil prices in 16 months on Tuesday when he set out plans in his State of the Union address to double US strategic oil reserves.

Oil prices rose 4.7 per cent to $55 a barrel after Mr Bush pledged to double the size of the reserves by 1.5bn barrels by 2027. Sam Bodman, energy secretary, said his department would start “purchasing crude oil in the spring at a rate of about 100,000 barrels per day”.