Saudi Oil Bypass Pipeline Remains Offline as Brent Tops $107
September 15, 2026
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Saudi Arabia’s East-West crude pipeline remained offline on September 15 after attacks on the 1,200-kilometer system forced a precautionary shutdown, removing the kingdom’s main overland route for bypassing the heavily disrupted Strait of Hormuz. The pipeline had been moving roughly 4 million barrels per day toward the Red Sea port of Yanbu during the regional crisis, while Aramco has demonstrated maximum throughput of 7 million barrels per day. Industry sources estimate Yanbu has only five to seven days of export-ready crude available without renewed pipeline inflows, and repair estimates range from a possible partial restart sooner to several weeks for broader restoration. The loss comes as commodity-vessel traffic through Hormuz fell to just four transits on Monday and Brent climbed 1.6% to $107.35 a barrel Tuesday morning. Saudi Arabia’s Energy Ministry has confirmed the shutdown and damage assessment but has not announced a restart date.
Saudi Export Route Watch · September 15, 2026
The Hormuz Bypass Is Now the Broken Link
Saudi Arabia built its East-West system to move eastern crude across the kingdom to the Red Sea. That route had become substantially more important after Hormuz traffic collapsed earlier this year.
Saudi Crude Escape Route
Eastern Saudi Arabia
Abqaiq / Gulf Supply
Crude originates in the kingdom's eastern production and processing system.
✕
East-West Pipeline
OFFLINE
1,200-km cross-country system. Maximum demonstrated capacity: 7.0M bpd. Roughly 4M bpd had recently been rerouted through it.
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Red Sea Outlet
Yanbu
Tanker loadings can continue temporarily from inventories, but the terminal is no longer being replenished through the main crude pipeline.
Brent · Sep. 15
$107.35
Up 1.58% at 1002 GMT as infrastructure and shipping risks remained elevated.
Recent Bypass Flow
~4M bpd
Approximate crude volume Saudi Arabia had been rerouting to Yanbu around Hormuz.
Yanbu Export Buffer
5–7 Days
Industry estimate of export-ready crude coverage without restored pipeline inflow.
Hormuz Commodity Transits
4
Preliminary Kpler count for Monday, down from 10 the previous day.
Pipeline Maximum
7.0M bpd
Aramco reached maximum East-West throughput during Q1 2026.
Saudi August Output
6.2M bpd
Down from 10.9M bpd in February before the regional war.
Hormuz Oil Baseline
20.9M bpd
Average oil flow through the strait in the first half of 2025.
Supply At Risk
Up to 4%
Industry estimate of global oil supply potentially affected by an extended pipeline outage.
Pipeline · Storage · Hormuz · Red Sea · Egypt
Saudi Export Resilience Board
The pipeline outage does not immediately stop Saudi exports, but each remaining fallback has a different physical, security or inventory constraint.
Scroll sideways for the complete route assessment
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| Route / Buffer | Current Status | Scale | What It Can Still Do | Constraint | Shipping Exposure |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| OFFLINE East-West Pipeline Abqaiq → Yanbu | Saudi Arabia shut the system after multiple attacks in the Riyadh and Madinah regions. Technical teams are assessing safety and damage. | 7.0M bpd Max Roughly 4M bpd had been rerouted through the system during the current crisis. | When operating, it moves eastern Saudi crude directly to the Red Sea without entering the Strait of Hormuz. | No official restart date. Industry and analyst repair estimates range from a partial restart sooner to several weeks. | Its loss removes Saudi Arabia's highest-capacity physical bypass around Hormuz. |
| DRAWING DOWN Yanbu Inventories | Red Sea loadings can continue using crude already positioned at or near the terminal. | 5–7 Days Estimated export coverage according to industry sources. | Allows scheduled tanker liftings to continue temporarily despite the pipeline shutdown. | Stocks are not being replenished by the East-West Pipeline and are not believed to be full. | Once the export-ready buffer is depleted, Yanbu loadings must fall unless pipeline inflow resumes. |
| LIMITED BUFFER Egyptian Storage Ain Sukhna / Sidi Kerir | Saudi Arabia has crude positioned at Egyptian terminals that can support customers for several additional days. | Industry estimates put total storage capacity at roughly 18M barrels at Ain Sukhna and 20M at Sidi Kerir. | Existing stocks can temporarily support Mediterranean and European deliveries. | These inventories do not replace the physical East-West connection needed to continuously move new Saudi crude to the Red Sea. | Provides a short-duration delivery buffer rather than a sustainable bypass solution. |
| SEVERELY CONSTRAINED Strait of Hormuz | Traffic remains far below normal levels as attacks, security concerns and stalled negotiations discourage transit. | 4 Commodity Ships Preliminary Monday count, compared with about 125 large commercial vessel transits per day before the war. | Saudi Gulf terminals remain physically capable of exporting crude if tanker passage is available. | Security, insurance, vessel availability and political restrictions sharply limit practical throughput. | Returning Saudi barrels to Gulf export terminals would again expose them to the chokepoint the pipeline was being used to avoid. |
| OPERATING / HIGH RISK Red Sea Maritime Route | Yanbu retains direct access north toward Suez and south toward Bab el-Mandeb. | Bab el-Mandeb recorded 21 commodity-vessel transits Monday, down from 28 the previous day. | Westbound crude from Yanbu can move toward Suez without transiting Hormuz. | Houthi advances and attacks are increasing security pressure near the southern entrance to the Red Sea. | Asian-bound cargoes leaving Yanbu toward the Indian Ocean face the Bab el-Mandeb risk zone. |
The Chokepoint Problem
Hormuz Pre-War Oil Flow
20.9M bpd
First-half 2025 average according to the U.S. EIA.
East-West Recent Flow
~4M bpd
Saudi crude rerouted around Hormuz before the latest shutdown.
August Saudi Production
6.2M bpd
More than 4M bpd below the 10.9M bpd reported for February.
Market Repair Range
Days → Weeks
No official repair timetable has been released by Saudi authorities.
Storage is a bridge, not a replacement route.
Yanbu and Egyptian inventories can preserve some near-term tanker deliveries, but sustained Red Sea exports ultimately require renewed crude inflow from eastern Saudi Arabia. A partial East-West restart would therefore materially change the export outlook even before the entire system is repaired.
Ship Universe Energy Route Tool
Saudi Bypass Outage & Export Runway Analyzer
Model how inventory, a partial East-West restart and limited alternative export flows change the crude-volume shortfall during a prolonged pipeline outage.
M bpd
Reuters reports roughly 4M bpd had recently been rerouted through the East-West system.
days
Midpoint of the reported five-to-seven-day Yanbu export buffer.
days
%
Scenario input. Saudi Arabia has not announced a partial-restart schedule.
M bpd
User-entered substitution through other routes such as limited Gulf exports.
M bpd
Rounded reference used only to express the modeled shortfall as a global percentage.
$/bbl
M bpd
Modeled Accessible Inventory
24M bbl
baseline bypass flow × entered stock-cover days
Effective Export Gap
4.0M bpd
after partial restart and alternative route assumptions
Inventory Exhaustion
6.0 Days
modeled days until the entered buffer is consumed
Post-Buffer Volume Shortfall
116M bbl
cumulative gap remaining after modeled inventory use
Global Supply Share at Risk
4.0%
daily modeled export gap versus world-supply reference
Pipeline Utilization Before Outage
57%
entered bypass flow versus 7M-bpd maximum capacity
Export Flow Stress Test
Compare the pre-outage bypass flow with modeled restoration, alternative routing and the remaining daily deficit.
Outage Scenario
Severe
The modeled outage lasts well beyond available inventory while no replacement flow is entered.
Outage Period
35 Days
Restored Flow
0.0M bpd
Brent Reference
$107.35
Uncovered Days
29.0
Scenario model:
The five-to-seven-day Yanbu figure is an industry estimate of export coverage, not a public Aramco inventory disclosure. The calculator converts that coverage into a modeled barrel buffer using the entered baseline flow. Alternative-route volumes and partial-restoration percentages are user assumptions and should not be read as forecasts of Saudi operations.
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