As Iran's toll charges on the Strait of Hormuz have effectively become reality, Middle Eastern nations are scrambling to secure overland energy bypass routes. The race reveals each country's calculation to seize control by reshaping the supply chain that has long centered on the Strait of Hormuz.
According to the Financial Times on Saturday, alternative routes are drawing attention as Iran's blockade of the Strait of Hormuz has cut off maritime shipping lanes and deepened bottlenecks in Middle Eastern crude exports. Oil-producing nations in the region are exploring pipelines connecting inland fields to ports, transporting crude to the Red Sea or the Mediterranean instead of through the Hormuz chokepoint.
The most prominent example is the Petroline, a 1,200-kilometer pipeline running east to west from Saudi Arabia's eastern oil fields to the Red Sea port of Yanbu. Built during the Iran-Iraq War in the 1980s to hedge against the risk of a Hormuz blockade, the pipeline is now regarded as a "lifeline" keeping crude exports flowing after the strait was shut. Saudi Arabia is discussing expanding existing routes and building new ones to push more volume through pipelines.
