The US-Israel war against Iran has triggered plans to build new pipelines, canals and land corridors to bypass the Strait of Hormuz to enable shipping and energy to be transported from the Persian Gulf region to both near and distant geographies. Two new pipelines over land (380-kilometer West-East Crude Pipeline which will run parallel to the existing Abu Dhabi Crude Oil Pipeline (ADCOP) and two canals (75 kilometers canal to connect the Persian Gulf directly to the Gulf of Oman, and the ‘Ben Gurion Canal’ project to connect the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea would help circumvent the Strait Hormuz and Suez Canal, have been mooted and are under serious consideration. Many Persian Gulf countries are also exploring land routes (through Jordan to Red Sea port of Aqaba, to China using rail corridor and land border crossing between Iran and Pakistan through the Gabd-Rimdan crossing) to bypass the Strait of Hormuz .

There are also plans to lay underwater pipelines. In the Indian context, though not new, the ongoing Hormuz crisis has triggered an urgency to revive the Middle East to India Deepwater Pipeline (MEIDP). The project has been on the drawing board for many years now. Now, some reports suggest that South Asia Gas Enterprise Pvt. Ltd. (SAGE) plans to revive underwater transnational pipeline to transport natural gas from Oman to Gujarat in India. This will be India’s first such deep underwater venture (~2,000 kilometers at depths >3,000 meters) and will potentially strengthen (~31 mmscmd of natural gas) energy security. SAGE notes that over the next ten years 3 Natural Gas pipelines will be developed to serve as “Common Carriers” and multiple gas sellers in the Persian Gulf region can use on payment of a Pipeline Tariff.

However, this idea of linking the Persian gulf energy resources to India has had a checkered history and the issue keeps coming up from time to time including the study by Assocham titled ‘The Middle East to India Deep-water Gas Pipeline (MEIDP): A Favourable Situation For All’, which had proposed “expeditious implementation of the multibillion-dollar project to help secure New Delhi’s long-term energy needs”.

According to reports, GAIL, Engineers India, and Indian Oil feasibility studies estimate construction time of 5 to 7 years and operations could commence by 2031–33 at a cost of ~₹40,000 crore ($4.8B),. Further, at “$2–2.25/MMBtu, it avoids volatile LNG prices and the Hormuz chokepoint (2/3 of India’s LNG imports passed through Hormuz in 2025)”.

It merits mention that before the ongoing Strait of Hormuz crisis, there were plans to include Iran into the network. In 2014, Iran had agreed to transport gas from its South Pars gas fields to India via the undersea pipeline. The issue was also discussed by the foreign ministers of Iran, Oman and India and there were negotiations on the issue of Iran-Oman-India (IOI) gas grid.

At that time, Iran was also willing to ship gas from Turkmenistan and facilitate linking that route to the IOI pipeline. But under the current circumstances, the 1,700 kilometer TAPI (Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India) pipeline project which will not only pass through difficult terrain but also restive Afghanistan and Pakistan would be a non-starter. In this context, the Iran-Pakistan-India (IPI) pipeline project was shelved due to politico-diplomatic and security reasons emerging from Pakistan.

The India–Oman Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) came into force on 1st June 2026, and the MEIDP dovetails into it and can “boosts trade to $11.18B (+5.3% YoY) via duty-free access on 99.38% of India’s exports and 127 service sub-sectors”.

Like many other Gulf countries, the UAE is currently confronted with the ‘Hormuz dilemma’ and has accorded high priority to building new pipelines that would drain in the Gulf of Oman-Arabian Sea and a canal (25 to 120-mile stretch across the UAE and Oman) for shipping to pass. The latter is a highly technical project and attracts not only financial but also technical challenges for the construction of the canal which involves cutting through the “Hajar Mountains toward Fujairah” which is an “extreme engineering challenges” and it could “hundreds of billions of dollars”.

It has been observed that “Panama Canal took about a decade to complete with enormous cost and engineering challenges”; the expansion of the Suez Canal required years of planning and construction; a canal is a generational infrastructure project, not a short-term pressure valve” and any bypass will require “approval from the United Arab Emirates, Oman, long-term regional security guarantees, massive international capital commitments”.

It is evident from the Strait of Hormuz crisis that energy pipelines, canals and land corridors will receive greeter attention in the future global infrastructure development plans. The global pipeline transportation market is currently valued at US $ 23.96 billion (2026) and is projected to grow from US $ 34.04 billion by 2034. However, long term stable geopolitical and geostrategic conditions will be a high prerequisite particularly for long duration project. There will also be new projects to circumvent maritime chokepoints such as the Straits of Malacca and one such project in this regard is the Kra Canal through Thailand.

Dr. Vijay Sakhuja is associated with the Kalinga International Foundation, New Delhi.