The Strait of Hormuz remains one of the world’s most critical energy chokepoints. Every day, roughly 20–20.9 million barrels of crude oil, condensate, and petroleum products flow through this narrow waterway between Iran and Oman. That volume accounts for about 20% of global petroleum liquids consumption and more than 25% of all seaborne traded oil. A prolonged disruption here would create immediate and severe supply shortfalls, dramatic price spikes, and widespread logistical challenges.
The question many policymakers, energy analysts, and market participants ask during periods of tension is whether existing oil pipelines can serve as viable alternatives and meet global demand in the event of a closure. The clear answer is no. Even when operating at maximum capacity, the region’s major bypass pipelines cannot offset more than a fraction of the volumes that normally transit the strait.
Why the Strait of Hormuz Matters So Much
In 2024 and the first half of 2025, daily flows through the strait averaged around 20 million barrels per day (b/d). This includes approximately 15 million b/d of crude oil and condensate plus another 5.5 million b/d of refined petroleum products. The largest share comes from Saudi Arabia, followed by the UAE, Iraq, Kuwait, Iran, and Qatar. The vast majority of this oil is destined for Asian markets, particularly China and India.
Rerouting tankers around the Arabian Peninsula adds hundreds of nautical miles, extra transit time, and significantly higher shipping costs. More importantly, not all producing countries have access to alternative export routes.
Existing Pipeline Alternatives and Their Real-World Limits
Several pipelines have been built specifically to reduce reliance on the Strait of Hormuz, but their combined capacity falls well short of what would be needed during a major disruption.
The largest and most important is Saudi Arabia’s East-West Pipeline, also known as Petroline. It runs from Abqaiq in the Gulf to Yanbu on the Red Sea and has a nameplate capacity of up to 7 million b/d. In practice, it already operates near full capacity, with a substantial portion of its throughput feeding domestic refineries rather than being available for export. Realistic export loadings from Yanbu are capped at around 4–5 million b/d due to terminal constraints. The pipeline has proven useful during past tensions, but it cannot scale much further.
The UAE’s Habshan–Fujairah pipeline (ADCOP) provides another important bypass. Running from onshore fields at Habshan to the Gulf of Oman port of Fujairah, it has a capacity of 1.5–1.8 million b/d and typically runs near its maximum. This route allows a portion of UAE crude to avoid the strait entirely, but Fujairah’s infrastructure limits how much additional volume can be pushed through quickly.
Iraq’s Kirkuk–Ceyhan pipeline to the Mediterranean offers a northern route with a theoretical capacity of 1.6 million b/d. However, actual throughput has been much lower—often only 0.2–0.65 million b/d—due to ongoing political disputes, security issues, and technical limitations. This pipeline primarily serves northern Iraqi fields; southern Iraqi exports, which form the bulk of the country’s production, still rely on Gulf terminals and the strait.
Iran has developed the Goreh–Jask pipeline, which terminates outside the strait on the Gulf of Oman. Its potential capacity is around 1 million b/d, but current utilization remains limited at roughly 0.3 million b/d.
Adding these together, the total realistic bypass capacity across all major pipelines is estimated at between 6 and 9 million b/d under the best conditions. Even optimistic assessments place spare capacity in the region at only about 2.6 million b/d during normal operations.
Supporting infrastructure, such as Egypt’s SUMED pipeline (which links the Red Sea to the Mediterranean with 2.5–3 million b/d capacity), can help move some Saudi oil onward to Europe without passing through the Suez Canal. However, it does not create new export capacity from the Gulf and still depends on oil first reaching the Red Sea via the East-West pipeline.
Why Pipelines Cannot Meet Global Demand
The fundamental problem is a large and persistent capacity gap. Even if every bypass pipeline were maximized, they could replace less than half of the volumes that normally flow through the Strait of Hormuz. Countries like Kuwait, much of Iraq, and Iran have no comparable alternative routes.
Additional constraints make full substitution even less feasible:
- Destination mismatch: Oil diverted to the Red Sea must then travel longer distances to reach key Asian buyers, increasing costs and transit times. Routes via the Red Sea also face their own potential chokepoints at Bab al-Mandeb and the Suez Canal.
- Terminal and refinery limits: A significant share of pipeline throughput is consumed by local refineries, reducing the volume available for export.
- Vulnerability to disruption: Land-based pipelines are exposed to the same geopolitical risks as seaborne traffic. They can be targeted by missiles, drones, or sabotage.
- Lack of new infrastructure: No major new pipelines capable of closing the gap are currently operational or nearing completion. Building sufficient redundancy would require investments in the tens or hundreds of billions of dollars and many years of construction.
Global oil demand currently stands at approximately 103–105 million barrels per day. Losing even 10–12 million b/d net supply after partial pipeline offsets would still trigger major market disruptions, higher prices, and potential economic ripple effects worldwide.
Conclusion
Oil pipelines provide valuable partial mitigation and have allowed Saudi Arabia and the UAE to maintain a degree of export flexibility during past periods of tension. However, they fall far short of offering a complete alternative to the Strait of Hormuz. In any prolonged closure scenario, the world would still face significant supply shocks that pipelines alone cannot resolve.
True long-term resilience would demand massive new infrastructure development, diversified energy sources, and strategic stockpiles—none of which can be deployed overnight. For the foreseeable future, the Strait of Hormuz remains irreplaceable for global oil trade, and any serious disruption would continue to carry profound consequences for energy markets and the broader economy.
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