Malacca Oil Throughput Falls to 16.6m Bpd as Hormuz Closure Strips Gulf Supply
EIA data show Malacca carried 16.6 million barrels a day in Q2 2026, down from 23.2 million in H1 2025, with bypass routes unable to close the gap.
The Strait of Malacca carried 16.6 million barrels a day in the second quarter of 2026, according to EIA data published in its short-term energy outlook on August 11 (2026-08-11) and cited in an OilPrice.com analysis on August 22 (2026-08-22) — down from 23.2 million barrels a day through the first half of 2025. The drop is the most direct measure yet of how far Hormuz's closure has reshaped global oil transit.7,6
The arithmetic is straightforward. Gulf crude moving east to Asian refiners clears Hormuz before it reaches the Phillips Channel near Singapore. With Hormuz shut, those barrels stop at the source. Malacca throughput falls as a consequence, not separately.7
Middle Eastern producers have been working through a short list of alternatives since the Strait of Hormuz closed to commercial traffic. CNBC reported on May 20 (2026-05-20) that nearly two months had passed since the closure with little clarity on when or how the U.S.-Iran conflict might be resolved. ADNOC chief executive Sultan Al Jaber said on that same date that more than 1 billion barrels had been lost, with roughly 100 million additional barrels being lost every week the strait stays shut.3,1
Al Jaber also disclosed on May 20 (2026-05-20) that ADNOC has built nearly 50% of a second pipeline designed to bypass Hormuz, with the remainder still under construction and no completion date specified. The UAE has redirected some exports through an existing pipeline to Fujairah, a terminal on the Gulf of Oman, which carries a maximum capacity of 1.8 million barrels a day. Hormuz averaged 21 million barrels a day in 2022, accounting for roughly 21% of global petroleum liquids consumption, EIA data show. Fujairah's ceiling covers less than a tenth of that baseline.1,2
Saudi Arabia's East-West crude oil pipeline, operated by Saudi Aramco with normal capacity of 5 million barrels a day, connects the Gulf to Yanbu on the Red Sea. Saudi Aramco temporarily expanded it to 7 million barrels a day in 2019 by repurposing natural gas liquids lines. But the Red Sea corridor has become unreliable independently of anything Saudi Aramco can do with the pipeline's rated throughput. Houthi attacks on Saudi shipping through the Bab el-Mandeb Strait have turned what was once a contingency into a second problem, OilPrice.com reported on August 22 (2026-08-22).4,2,7
The Suez Canal sits downstream of the same constraint. Its value as a transit corridor for crude moving toward Europe depends on tankers first clearing Bab el-Mandeb. War on the Rocks noted on August 5 (2026-08-05) that Houthi attacks on Saudi shipping had layered additional maritime risk on top of the Hormuz closure, compressing both Gulf and Red Sea options simultaneously.5
The Panama Canal offers a different kind of immovability. Fiscal 2025 saw 13,404 transits and $5.7 billion in revenue, with daily transit slots fixed at 36.7 A $1.6 billion expansion project will add no capacity before 2031, so on any timeline relevant to the current disruption, Panama's slot count does not move.7
Druzhba pipeline volumes offer little offset. The line, which moves Russian and Central Asian crude westward into Europe, carried 4.7 million barrels a day last quarter against 4.9 million barrels a day in the first half of 2025, OilPrice.com reported on August 22 (2026-08-22). Its fixed geography and the political framework governing Russian crude exports leave it largely insulated from Middle Eastern supply events — and irrelevant to the Asia-bound volumes that Malacca's throughput figures capture.7
ICE Brent crude front-month closed at $93.60 a barrel on August 22 (2026-08-22), with Dubai crude at $89.52 a barrel on the same date. JKM Asian LNG closed at $22.94 per million British thermal units on August 22 (2026-08-22), reflecting sustained tightness in cargoes reaching northeast Asian buyers through the curtailed Malacca corridor.7
Al Jaber set a floor on the recovery timeline on May 20 (2026-05-20): even if the conflict ends immediately, getting Hormuz flows back to 80% of normal would take at least four months. ADNOC's second bypass pipeline is roughly half built, with no target date in available disclosures. Without a usable Bab el-Mandeb corridor, Saudi Arabia's Red Sea route cannot absorb the slack regardless of what the East-West pipeline can physically carry. The pace of ADNOC's construction and the security situation at Bab el-Mandeb are the two variables that will ultimately determine how quickly Malacca throughput recovers — and neither is moving quickly.1