Qatar's Energy Minister and CEO of QatarEnergy Saad Sherida Al-Kaabi speaks during a press conference. AFP
“Everybody that has not called for force majeure we expect will do so in the next few days that this continues. All exporters in the Gulf region will have to call force majeure,” Al-Kaabi told the Financial Times.
The minister warned that crude prices could reach $150 a barrel within two to three weeks, while natural gas could climb to $40 per million British thermal units if ships and tankers are unable to transit the strait.
“If this war continues for a few weeks, GDP growth around the world will be impacted,” he added, noting that even if the war ended immediately, it would take Qatar “weeks to months” to return to a normal cycle of deliveries.
The Strait of Hormuz carries around one-fifth of the world’s oil supply, but traffic through the narrow passage has all but halted since the US-Israel war with Iran began last weekend, sending shockwaves through global energy markets.
Qatar halted liquefied natural gas production earlier this week, disrupting supply from a country that normally provides about 20 percent of global LNG and is a key supplier to Asian and European markets.
According to Reuters, India has begun rationing natural gas, while officials and companies in Japan, Taiwan, Bangladesh, and Pakistan are scrambling to secure alternative supplies. Japan is also considering releasing part of its national oil reserves.
In the United States, Energy Secretary Chris Wright sought to play down the impact of higher fuel costs, saying gasoline prices should fall within weeks rather than months.
“I think it’s a matter of weeks, not months,” Wright said in an interview with Fox News on Friday, describing the recent surge as “a little bit of an interruption right now.”
President Donald Trump also dismissed concerns about rising fuel prices during the conflict.
“They’ll drop very rapidly when this is over, and if they rise, they rise, but this is far more important than having gasoline prices go up a little bit,” Trump said in an interview with Reuters on Thursday.
Despite US officials downplaying the impact of the war on energy markets, Wright said the US Navy would begin escorting ships through the Strait of Hormuz once military assets in the region can shift their focus away from Iran’s retaliatory strikes.
“As soon as it’s reasonable to do it, we’ll escort ships through the straits and get the energy moving again,” he said, referring to efforts to restore safe passage through the waterway that handles roughly a fifth of global oil shipments.
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