@pipeworx/eia

Connect: https://gateway.pipeworx.io/eia/mcp · Install: one-click buttons

Tools: 5

The official US energy data: petroleum, natural gas, electricity, coal, renewables, nuclear, total energy, international energy. Production, consumption, prices, reserves, imports/exports — at national, state, and (for electricity) plant level. Free, requires a free API key.

Why this matters for AI agents

For energy questions — “what’s the price of natural gas?”, “how much electricity comes from solar?”, “are gasoline prices rising?” — EIA is the source. Government-grade data, no commercial markup. Pair with FRED for energy-related macro indicators and NOAA for energy-relevant weather context.

Common flows:

• Spot prices. “What’s WTI crude trading at?” → crude oil spot price series.
• State electricity mix. “What % of California electricity is solar?” → state-level generation by source.
• Retail gasoline. “Average price for a gallon last week?” → weekly retail prices.
• Natural gas storage. “How much working gas in storage?” → weekly EIA-915 reports.

Auth

EIA Open Data API requires a free key from https://www.eia.gov/opendata/register.php. Pass via _apiKey. Generous rate limits.

Major datasets

Series IDs

EIA series follow dataset_id.frequency.region.product patterns. Examples:

• PET.RWTC.D — WTI crude, daily
• NG.RNGC1.D — Natural gas Henry Hub, daily
• ELEC.GEN.SUN-CA-99.M — California solar generation, monthly
• PET.EMM_EPMR_PTE_NUS_DPG.W — US weekly average regular gasoline price

Use the eia_search tool to find IDs rather than constructing them manually.

Common pitfalls

• Reporting lag varies. Petroleum prices update weekly with ~3-day lag. Electricity generation is monthly with ~2-month lag. Don’t assume “current” matches across datasets.
• Heat content vs volume. Natural gas reported in BCF (billion cubic feet), MMcf, and energy units (BTU, MMBtu). Conversions matter for cross-fuel comparison.
• Net vs gross generation. Power-plant generation has subtle definitions. “Net” subtracts plant-internal use. EIA mostly publishes net. Don’t double-count.
• State electricity by primary mover. EIA’s state-level mix is by primary mover (steam turbine, combined cycle, etc.) AND fuel — same plant can have multiple categorizations. Aggregate to the level your question requires.
• Forecasts are scenarios. AEO (Annual Energy Outlook) is a reference-case projection plus side-cases. Don’t treat reference case as “what will happen.”
• No market-real-time prices. EIA spot prices are official end-of-day; for intra-day market prices you need a commercial feed, not EIA.

Tools

• eia_series — Search EIA for any energy data series by route path. Returns historical data points with timestamps and values. Use for specific energy metrics not covered by category tools.
• eia_petroleum — Get petroleum prices (gasoline, diesel, crude oil) and stock levels by region. Returns time series with prices, volumes, and regional breakdowns.
• eia_natural_gas — Get natural gas prices, production, consumption, and storage by US region. Returns time series for supply, demand, and inventory metrics.
• eia_electricity — Get electricity generation by fuel source, retail sales, and prices by region. Returns time series for supply and pricing data.
• eia_ethanol — Get fuel ethanol production volumes, stocks, and imports. Returns time series for ethanol supply chain metrics.