(MENAFN- Khaleej Times) By night, the lights of dozens of ships anchored off Fujairah port create the mirage of a far-off city at sea.
The crowded anchorage reflects the emirate's rise as one of the world's busiest maritime refuelling stations. Soon it will also become a vital new exit route for Arabian crude oil destined for world markets.
The UAE is nearing completion of a pipeline through the emirate that will allow it to reroute the bulk of its oil exports around the Strait of Hormuz at the mouth of the Gulf, the path for a fifth of the world's oil supply.
With the new pipeline, oil from fields deep in the Abu Dhabi desert would travel 380 kilometres overland and across the Hajar mountains to this fast-growing port on edge of the Indian Ocean.
At the moment, oil exports are loaded in the Gulf and must pass through the Strait of Hormuz. Once it is running at full volume, the pipeline will let the UAE get two-thirds of its peak oil production to market even if the strait is shut. That's about 10 per cent of the total 17 million barrels of oil a day that currently goes through Hormuz.
The director-general of Fujairah municipality, Mohammed Saif Al Afkham, said he expects the pipeline to be commissioned this month. "This will add a lot to the shipment of oil, and it will make it faster and easier instead of going to the Gulf," he said.
Minister of Energy Mohammed bin Dha'en Al Hamili told a Paris conference last month the four-foot-wide pipeline is finished and is being tested.
It is designed to handle 1.5 million barrels of crude a day. Al Hamli has said that figure could rise to 1.8 million barrels.
The International Petroleum Investment Co, or Ipic, is building the pipeline while a subsidiary of China National Petroleum Corp has been contracted to construct it.
The project is immensely important for the UAE, which is Opec's third largest exporter of oil. Minister of Economy Sultan bin Saeed Al Mansouri said last week the pipeline would also offer additional export capacity if oil production increases.
For Fujairah, the pipeline is a way to solidify its standing as an emerging petroleum hub.
About two dozen ships on average already pick up fuel for their own engines in Fujairah every day, according to editor Ada Taib at Bunkerworld, an online site that tracks the industry. Port authority estimates show it is now the world's second busiest maritime refuelling spot globally after Singapore, she said.
The waterfront around Fujairah port is dotted with more than 100 towering fuel silos. Eight larger storage tanks, each capable of holding one million barrels of crude, mark the terminus for the new oil pipeline.
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