Oil Transportation - Transportation Routes

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Oil Transportation

The Two Most Important Kinds ofTransportation Routes:Oil Tankers and Oil Pipelines have routes that allow for oil to travel over seas, over borders, and all around the

world.

Oil TankersOil Shipped Around the World

The Transfer of oil from one country to another is a very large task. Billions of barrels of oil a day are shipped

in Oil Tankers to various destinations all over the world. There are many different shipping routes, but there

are six major transit chokepoints which deal with the most traffic of oil tankers and are areas of high risk for

something to go wrong with the oil transfer. The Strait of Hormuz, The Strait of Malacca, The Suez Canal, Babel-Mandab, The Turkish Straits, and The Panama Canal are different areas of the sea that connect large bodies

of water and can sometimes create bottleneck situations. The Strait of Hormuz is an area where tankers from

Persian Gulf nations (mainly the Middle East) travel through to get to their destinations in the United States,

Japan, China, and Western Europe, connecting the Persian Gulf with the Gilf of Oman. About 40% of all Oil

Tanker traffic passes through The Strait of Hormuz because (as seen on the graph below) the Middle East is

the leader of oil production, thus making them the lead exporter of oil. The Strait of Malacca is a smaller area

of passage than most chokepoints, but it is one of the most unsafe passages of any transport route in the

world. It is the target of many terrorist attacks because of its bottleneck design in the Singapore Strait. The

area of passage is located in between the island of Malaysia and Indonesia because it is the shortest route to

get Oil into Japan, China, and other Asian countries. The Suez Canal in Egypt connects the Red Sea to the

Mediterranean Sea, only allowing smaller tankers to pass through, transporting Oil mainly to Europe, but also

to the Unites States. The Oil comes from some revenues in Asia but mainly from Saudi Arabia, again, making

this chokepoint an export region for the Middle East. Bab-el Mandab is a chokepoint between the Red Sea and

The Gulf of Aden which begins the only transportation route that transports Persian Gulf Oil exclusively. Many

of the times, the oil the Persian Gulf and Middle Eastern countries export gets sifted in with other countrys oil,

which makes the Bab el-Mandab unique. The oil from this area travels directly to Europe and the Unites

States. Both Bosporus and Dardanelles are canals that make up The Turkish Straits and basically divide Asian

countries on the Black Sea from European countries that end the Mediterranean Sea. Oil that is being

transported out of Russia and other regions of the Black Sea first encounter the Bosporus which is a small

canal leading into a sort of mini-sea, which then leads to the Dardanelles canal which carries the Tankers out

into the Mediterranean sea. These tankers end up in Europe, providing them with much of their oil. The sixth

Chokepoint is The Panama Canal that takes Oi l generated in the United States to other areas of the United

States and to Latin American countries. All of these transportation routes are listed in order from most barrels

transported per day to the least. The Strait of Hornez transports the most with about 16.5 billion barrels per

day, while The Panama Canal only transfers about a million.

Oil is transported to and from other various places, but the main producers and consumers are depicted in the

bar graph. North America, Latin America, the Middle East, Russia (the former USSR), Europe, and Asia

comprise most of the world, creating a s ituation where international over-sea transportation of oil via oil

tankers is vital and extremely valuable.

Oil Tanker Shipping Routeswww.cere.gr/upload/EIDIKESMELETES-KEY%20WOLRD%20OIL%2

Transportation - Transportation Routes http://ckrhmt2008.weebly.com/transportation-routes.html

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Production and Consumption Determine Transportation RoutesGraph made by Carly Klinger from picture:http://www.black-tides.com/uk/oil/transport-oil/main-oil-transport-

routes.php

Strait of Hormuz (The Most Important Transit Choke point)http://www.eia.doe.gov/cabs/World_Oil_Transit_Chokepoints/Full.html

Oil Pipelines


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The Easiest Way to Travel

Oil Pipelines are the most efficient method of transporting oil. In the maps below, it can be seen that pipeline

routes are very intricate and widespread. The pipelines are designed to take oil all over the country that they

inhibit. America is the best example of these pipeline routes because America has the longest cumulative

mileage of pipeline in the world. There are so many pipelines throughout the world that it is nearly impossible

to find every single pipeline pump and location, but the major oil consuming and producing countries have the

most total mileage of pipeline. The areas in which oil is produced are generally located far away from main

areas of consumption, large market places, cities, and companies that need oil for production. The routes that

these pipelines travel are able to be extremely direct because the quickest way from one point to another is bytraveling in a straight line. Pipelines do not disrupt their surroundings allowing them to be built in the most

direct routes possible. The fact that oil travels quickly though the pipelines and their ability to directly provide

consumer areas with the needed amount is making pipelines more and more popular, especially in the United

States.

American Pipeline Routes

http://www.pipeline101.com/Overv iew/crude-pl.html

Russian and European Pipelineshttp://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/spl/hi/guides/456900/456974/html/nn4page1.stm

Asian Pipeline Network Now and in the Futurehttp://chinaperspectives.revues.org/document2962.html


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Middle East Pipelines and Proposed Pipelineshttp://www.thedossier.ukonline.co.uk/MAPS%20&%20CHARTS/CASPIAN-

MIDDLE%20EAST_OIL%20&%20MILITARY%20PRESENCE.JPG

A Link to More Informationhttp://people.hofstra.edu/geotrans/eng/ch5en/appl5en/ch5a1en.html

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