Saudi Arabia and UAE accelerate Red Sea pipeline and port investments

Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are accelerating billions of dollars in new pipeline and port investments across the Red Sea and the wider Gulf, part of a strategic push to build export routes that bypass the Strait of Hormuz as regional tensions persist. The push follows renewed alarm over Hormuz, the narrow waterway between Iran and Oman through which roughly a fifth of global oil supply transits, after repeated threats to shipping during periods of heightened Iran-linked conflict. Riyadh has continued expansion work tied to its Red Sea coast projects, including infrastructure supporting NEOM and other giga-projects under Vision 2030, while also examining additional capacity for its East-West pipeline, which already allows Saudi crude to reach Red Sea export terminals at Yanbu without transiting Hormuz at all. In the UAE, investment is concentrated on Fujairah, the emirate's Indian Ocean-facing port on the Gulf of Oman, where container-terminal and storage expansions are underway to reinforce it as an alternative export and bunkering hub outside the strait. The Abu Dhabi Crude Oil Pipeline already carries crude from onshore fields directly to Fujairah, giving the UAE existing bypass capacity that these new investments aim to deepen. For Qatar and the wider Gulf, the buildout underscores a shared regional interest in diversifying energy export infrastructure away from a single chokepoint, even as Doha's own LNG exports via the Gulf remain more directly exposed to any disruption at Hormuz than Saudi or Emirati crude flows now routed through the Red Sea and Fujairah.