Saudi Arabia has shut down its 1,200-kilometre East–West oil pipeline after the critical crude route came under aerial attack, putting renewed pressure on an already strained global oil market.
The pipeline, also known as Petroline, transports crude from Saudi Arabia’s oil-producing east to Yanbu on the Red Sea, allowing the kingdom to bypass the Strait of Hormuz. Saudi Arabia’s Energy Ministry said the shutdown was taken as a precaution after drone attacks struck areas around Riyadh and Medina, causing injuries and damage that authorities were still assessing.
The timing makes the disruption particularly significant. The Strait of Hormuz has been severely restricted amid the ongoing US-Iran conflict, making Saudi Arabia’s overland route to the Red Sea one of the country's most important alternatives for reaching international markets.
The pipeline has been carrying roughly 4–5 million barrels of crude per day in recent months, according to shipping trackers and analysts cited by Reuters — equivalent to around 4–5% of global oil supply.
The Pipeline Built to Bypass Hormuz
The East–West pipeline was designed precisely for situations in which Saudi Arabia needs an alternative route to the Gulf.
Stretching from the Abqaiq area in the Eastern Province to Yanbu, the system gives Saudi crude a land-based path across the Arabian Peninsula rather than requiring every barrel destined for export to pass through Hormuz. The U.S. Energy Information Administration puts the pipeline's normal capacity at 5 million barrels per day, although Saudi Arabia has previously expanded it to around 7 million bpd by converting additional infrastructure to carry crude.
That redundancy has become especially valuable this year.
Saudi Arabia increased flows through the system as disruptions around Hormuz and the Bab el-Mandeb threatened maritime exports. But the latest attack demonstrates the limitation of that strategy: an alternative route is only as resilient as the infrastructure protecting it.
And this is not the first time the pipeline has come under attack. The East–West system was also targeted earlier this year, although Saudi Aramco was able to restore operations relatively quickly.
A Pipeline Problem That Could Become a Global Oil Problem
The immediate question is how long the shutdown will last.
Reuters reported on September 13 that industry sources estimated Saudi export stocks at Yanbu could sustain shipments for only five to seven days if the pipeline remains offline. One source estimated repairs could take five to six weeks, although another suggested pumping could resume sooner or partially restart while repairs continue. Saudi authorities have not given a definitive timeline.
That uncertainty is what makes the incident more significant than a temporary pipeline outage.
Saudi Arabia's crude production had already fallen sharply, with the International Energy Agency reporting August output of around 6.2 million barrels per day, down from 10.9 million bpd in February. Reuters also reported that global oil supply is expected to decline by about 5.7 million bpd this year, further tightening the market.
At the same time, the security picture around the Red Sea is deteriorating. Houthi forces have intensified their activity and reportedly seized Perim Island at the entrance to the Bab el-Mandeb, another strategic passage for global shipping.
The result is an increasingly uncomfortable energy map for Saudi Arabia.
Hormuz is constrained. The Red Sea is becoming more dangerous. And now the pipeline designed to connect the kingdom's oilfields to the Red Sea has itself been attacked.
The episode underlines a broader lesson for energy infrastructure planners: diversification of routes is essential, but redundancy does not eliminate risk — it redistributes it.
For global oil markets, the stakes are particularly high. Reuters reported on Sunday that a prolonged outage could eventually put up to 4% of global oil supply at risk, depending on how quickly Saudi Arabia restores the pipeline and how much crude can be redirected through other routes and stocks.
What was built as a way around the world's most important oil chokepoint has now become another critical point of vulnerability.
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