Saudi Arabia is rerouting Asian energy shipments to Yanbu on the Red Sea, Reuters reports, citing three insiders. The move could elevate the port from a secondary terminal to a key east-west gateway. Rising costs tied to Hormuz — from higher ins. premiums to security risks — are forcing a major rethink of regional logistics, though the exact volume of supplies being shifted to Yanbu is still unclear.

Who’s involved so far?

Egypt has offered its Sumed pipeline –– Ain Sokhna to Sidi Kerir — to facilitate the transfer of Saudi crude oil from Yanbu to the Mediterranean, effectively creating a land-to-pipe bridge, a government source told EnterpriseAM. This would avoid potential ins. premiums associated with Red Sea sailings. A notable concern for commercial shipping after the threat of Houthi attacks on commercial vessels has sharply escalated since the tensions began earlier this week.

The pipeline isn’t a like-for-like replacement for Hormuz: Its capacity is much lower, former Oil Minister Osama Kamal tells EnterpriseAM. Instead, “Sumed could provide a temporary solution” to help Aramco fulfill its contracts with European offtakers, former Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company head Medhat Youssef told us.

“Don't expect the Suez Canal to recover for at least six months,” Arab Academy for Science, Technology, and Maritime Transport VP Mohamed Daoud told EnterpriseAM. Shipping agencies announce their schedules three to six months in advance, depending on the nature of each shipping line, and therefore book cargo and ports. “Thus, even after the war ends, the impact will continue for at least six months until a different decision is made.”

Pakistan has urged the kingdom to provide an alternative supply route for its petroleum, eyeing Yanbu as a potential solution amid ongoing disruptions. Saudi Arabia reaffirmed it was securing supplies through the channel during a meeting between Pakistan’s Petroleum Minister Ali Pervaiz Malik and Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to Pakistan Nawaf Al Malki.

They aren’t wasting any time: The Pak-Arab Refinery Company (Parco) secured two 70k-barrel crude oil cargoes via alternative routes that bypass the Strait of Hormuz. The first was transported through Saudi Arabia’s East-West Crude Oil Pipeline to Red Sea export terminals, while the second was loaded at the Fujairah Port in the Gulf of Oman. By securing these routes, Parco — which handles 120k barrels per day — has extended its crude stock cover to March 25, ensuring it remains at full operational capacity despite the regional bottleneck.

Why this matters

Major crude oil storage sites in the Kingdom are filling up quickly, as Saudi’s key export route through the Strait of Hormuz remains closed to shipping, geospatial analytics company Kayrros co-founder Antoine Halff said on LinkedIn. Four out of six tanks at the Ras Tanura refinery are already full, and the Ju’aymah terminal on the country’s east coast is “quickly running out of space.”

REMEMBER- A 25-day countdown started on Monday, marking the time Middle East oil producers have before they run out of storage space, according to analysts at JP Morgan. If the strait remains closed beyond this window, producers may have to stop output entirely because there will be nowhere left to put the oil.

The kingdom has spent bns expanding its East-West pipeline and Yanbu South Terminal on the Red Sea. For operators, this is a stress test for Saudi Arabia’s land bridge ambitions. By bypassing Hormuz, Riyadh is attempting to insulate its trade flows from regional volatility while positioning the Red Sea coast as the more stable, cost-effective hub. If Yanbu can handle the surge, it could offer a way to decouple the GCC’s economy from the narrow chokepoint of the strait.

Some hurdles to overcome

The Saudi East-West pipeline moves 5 mn bpd — far less than the 20 mn that normallypass through Hormuz. However, it stands as the most viable alternative for the Kingdom at present, with overland corridors, like the International North-South Transport Corridor, lacking the TEU capacity to handle diverted Suez traffic that the Cape of Good Hope can handle.

Could Egypt serve as a lifeline? The Sumed pipeline has a 10k bpd capacity and currently transports 5k bpd. “Sumed could provide a temporary solution,” petroleum expert and former head of the Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company told EnterpriseAM.

Aramco currently has contracts running for the operation of the pipeline and owns several storage facilities, along with other unnamed companies. Sumed will “play a significant role in fulfilling contracts between Aramco and European countries by utilizing its capacity to reach the Mediterranean via the Sumed terminal to Sidi Kerir, and from there to ships at the ports of Alexandria and Dekheila,” he explained.

How much can Saudi Arabia’s pipeline really handle? While the East-West Pipeline has a standard nameplate capacity of 5 mn bpd, Aramco proved it could stretch this to 7 mn bpd, when it temporarily expanded its capacity in 2019 amid tensions in the Gulf. The real question is whether pumping stations — many of which have been upgraded over the last decade — can maintain the 7 mn bpd throughput sustainability if the blockade of Hormuz lasts for months rather than weeks.

It’s all a trade-off: The 7 mn bpd figure was a temporary sprint, in which the kingdom used NGL lines for crude. This was a logistical trade-off, as it reduces the country’s ability to move gas liquids to its petrochemical hubs and power plants.

If Saudi Arabia can’t hold 7 mn bbl / d, it will face a bottleneck — meaning only around a quarter of its total production would be able to safely bypass Hormuz. Asian buyers — the primary market for this crude — will have to weigh up the risk versus reward of this move.

The GCC’s supply issues aren’t limited to Hormuz — refineries and storage facilities are at risk of attack. This leaves a key issue — even if alternative supply routes are secured, as long as energy infrastructure faces attack, supply could be snagged or take a literal hit at any moment.

While petroleum logistics have a workaround, the same cannot be said for LNG. South Asia’s reliance on Qatari gas remains tethered to the strait, as Saudi Arabia lacks comparable Red Sea LNG export infrastructure.

What’s next?

Easing away from a reliance on Hormuz? “I would consider this only a short-term solution until the conflict ends,” Equity Research Analyst at Gabelli Funds Jens Zimmermann told EnterpriseAM. That said, tension always has the potential to flare up again. “I could imagine that Saudi could invest in building more pipeline capacity to the Red Sea. That would take time, but could be considered a ‘long-term solution’ to diversify its export channels,” Zimmermann added.

We’re watching out for Asian supply contracts. If China and India follow Pakistan’s lead, Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea initiative could become the most viable option to bypass Hormuz.

The disruption will hit Asian markets hardest, as they uptake 45.7% of their total crude load and 29.5% of their gasoline via the strait. Countries like Japan, China, and India — which rely on the Middle East for the vast majority of their crude — are facing immediate supply gaps as tankers are unable to exit the Gulf.

We’re waiting to hear more about the volume being funneled through the pipeline. This will indicate how reliant Saudi Aramco plans to be on its East-West Pipeline to facilitate this Red Sea pivot.

Background

The math for a Suez-Hormuz bypass is catastrophic for margins. Rerouting Indian or Gulf exports around the Cape of Good Hope adds 15 to 20 days to transit times — but the bigger shock is the war-risk premium, which has jumped from 0.025% to 0.5% of vessel value in just a matter of days. With Brent crude surging to USD 130 per barrel on Hormuz closure fears, the delivered cost of goods is no longer predictable — exporters who paid USD 300 for a container to Dubai are now starting at USD 1.2k.

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