The expert assessed the timing of the construction of oil pipelines bypassing the Strait of Hormuz.

The construction of new oil pipelines in the Middle East bypassing the Strait of Hormuz will require billions of dollars in investments and will take 5-10 years, while expanding existing routes is considered a more realistic way to reduce risks. This was announced on April 4 by Ivan Timonin, Senior manager of the Implementation consulting company.

"The most realistic scenario is the expansion of existing routes. First of all, we are talking about the Saudi East–West pipeline, which connects fields in the Persian Gulf with the Yanbu port on the Red Sea. This is an already functioning system, and its capacity can be increased faster than building new routes from scratch," he told RIA Novosti.

Timonin noted that about 20 million barrels of oil and petroleum products pass through the Strait of Hormuz every day, which accounts for about 20% of global consumption of liquid hydrocarbons.

At the same time, the combined capacity of existing bypass routes in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is about 6-7 million barrels per day, and the actual available volumes may be lower due to infrastructure constraints.

It is noted that the complete replacement of supplies across the strait will require significant capacity expansion, which makes the task extremely difficult even in the long term.

The expert stressed that the construction of new main oil pipelines will require multibillion-dollar investments and will take 5-10 years, and a significant part of the time will be spent on route coordination, interstate agreements and infrastructure development.

According to him, the launch of such projects is justified only if there is a long-term sustainable threat to transit through the Strait of Hormuz, since their use for short-term crises is economically impractical.

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The Financial Times reported on April 2 that the Gulf states are exploring the possibility of building new pipelines bypassing the Strait of Hormuz due to the risk of prolonged Iranian control of the strait. It was clarified that such pipelines could be a way to reduce the vulnerability of countries in the region to disruptions in the strait.

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