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By late August, even limited shipments from the gas heavyweight\u00a0had all but\u00a0stopped\u00a0following\u00a0a\u00a0projectile attack\u00a0on one of its\u00a0tankers outside the Strait of Hormuz. Pressure was growing, not only from energy-starved clients but also from inside an\u00a0economy built on regular deliveries.\n\n\n\nThen senior executives at QatarEnergy saw a potential fix \u2014\u00a0Al Rayyan, one of the oldest vessels in the fleet.\n\n\n\nOut in the calm waters of the Gulf, a few hours from the country\u2019s\u00a0coast, Al Rayyan\u2019s captain\u00a0had been\u00a0idling for days when the order came through.\u00a0With security assurances from the US Navy in hand, he was given the green light, but was told to sail out\u00a0quietly, without transponders or lights.\u00a0At the helm of a 29-year-old gas tanker \u2014\u00a0a dinosaur in\u00a0a flotilla that includes some of the most expensive vessels in the world \u2014 the shipmaster\u00a0would be testing a vital workaround.\n\n\n\nIt worked. The tanker slipped through\u00a0and headed\u00a0toward the port of Sohar in Oman on\u00a0Sept. 10. A few days later, it was met by another Qatar-controlled\u00a0vessel, the Al Mas\u2019habiyyah, a state-of-the-art carrier built in 2025. The second\u00a0ship would now\u00a0carry\u00a0the cargo of liquefied natural gas on to its final destination:\u00a0China.\n\n\n\nAl Rayyan headed back through Hormuz, for its next load.\n\n\n\nBloomberg News interviewed more than two\u00a0dozen traders and officials to piece together Qatar\u2019s efforts to steadily\u00a0restore\u00a0its position as a leading LNG exporter \u2014 until the war began, it was second only to the United States \u2014 even without a clear end in sight for the\u00a0conflict between the US and Iran that has destabilized the region. Their accounts,\u00a0provided under condition of anonymity\u00a0given the sensitive\u00a0nature of the issue,\u00a0offer\u00a0a glimpse into how a gas\u00a0powerhouse has\u00a0begun to\u00a0adapt to a new and uncertain reality.\n\n\n\nQatar\u00a0provided nearly a fifth of global LNG last year and so is closely monitored by traders and rival producers. A\u00a0sustained recovery\u00a0could ease\u00a0strain in the market\u00a0at a time when winter is approaching and prices are at their highest in years.\n\n\n\n\u201cIt has to adapt in the near term. Its entire model is based on shipping huge volumes through\u00a0the strait,\u201d said\u00a0Toby\u00a0Copson, China-based managing partner\u00a0at Davenport Energy, which trades oil and gas.\u00a0 \u201cIf Qatar can establish a more regular export route, it would start to ease one of the biggest constraints on the global LNG market.\u201d\n\n\n\nQatarEnergy did not respond to Bloomberg queries.\n\n\n\nSince the US war with Iran\u00a0began disrupting shipments, all energy producers in the Gulf have been forced to find\u00a0new ways to get fuel to customers across Asia and Europe. Large oil exporters and traders have increasingly turned to\u00a0shuttle runs,\u00a0which send\u00a0laden\u00a0\u201cmother\u201d\u00a0vessels through the waterway \u2014 often\u00a0older vessels, traveling without lights or transponders that usually aid navigation\u00a0\u2014\u00a0to be met by \u201cdaughter\u201d vessels waiting in the Gulf of Oman, ready to\u00a0take the cargo, typically crude, to any destination.\n\n\n\nTransfers at sea are far harder and costlier for LNG, a fuel that needs to be\u00a0chilled to minus 162C (-260F) and pressurized. Moving it requires special, cryogenic hoses and trained crews. But with oil shipments flowing through the summer, executives around Saad Sherida Al-Kaabi, an industry veteran who serves as Qatar\u2019s energy minister and QatarEnergy\u2019s chief executive officer, were\u00a0growing concerned,\u00a0according to people with knowledge of the company\u2019s strategy. They\u00a0could see gas cargoes\u00a0from the US replacing shipments for major clients like India, while\u00a0China was stepping up efforts to diversify away from the Gulf.\n\n\n\nWith an economy built around LNG, Qatar\u2019s needs are pressing. Every week that Ras Laffan\u2019s operations are not exporting\u00a0costs the country roughly $1 billion in lost sales, according to Bloomberg calculations based on current long-term deliver prices,\u00a0a significant sum for a $200\u00a0billion economy.\u00a0The International Monetary Fund estimates Qatar could suffer an\u00a0contraction of 15.6%\u00a0this year.\n\n\n\nThere was no alternative but to restart shipments, Al-Kaabi\u2019s team decided\u00a0\u2014 though\u00a0other levers would\u00a0be pulled simultaneously, including an expansion of\u00a0trading operations in an effort to profit from the same\u00a0dislocation that was hobbling the company.\n\n\n\nAfter Al Rayyan\u2019s run, exports through Hormuz\u00a0cranked up. Over the four weeks that followed the first crossing,\u00a0roughly 20 tankers carrying Qatari LNG exited Hormuz, according to ship-tracking data and people familiar with the operations, racing back once empty. Deliveries approached a third of prewar levels by the end of September, a speed that caught even customers off guard. Buyers, particularly in India, had written off Qatari deliveries after the difficulties of the first months and now had to scramble to make room for arrivals.\n\n\n\n\u201cIt is absolutely a cornerstone for global energy security,\u201d said Peter Clarke, senior vice president for LNG at ExxonMobil, which has a stake in the Ras Laffan export plant\u2019s production trains, speaking in September around\u00a0the time the country was ramping up its shipments. Qatar, he told an industry conference, would \u201ccontinue to play a really important role.\u201d\n\n\n\nStill, attacks have not stopped \u2014\u00a0\u00a0a new wave last week targeted\u00a0a tanker linked to QatarEnergy\u00a0\u2014 testing the country\u2019s resolve almost daily.\n\n\n\nQatar\u2019s\u00a0recovery\u00a0effort began back in March, in the first days of the war and\u00a0immediately after the vast Ras Laffan complex was struck. Missile\u00a0and drone attacks forced the first interruption to supply in three decades of operation,\u00a0pushing customers to scramble for replacements.\n\n\n\nThe upheaval posed\u00a0an unprecedented threat for a producer that preferred to lock buyers, mostly in Asia and Europe, into\u00a0decades-long\u00a0contracts with strict terms and rigid pricing. Qatar\u2019s reliability \u2014\u00a0until this year, it had\u00a0never declared force majeure \u2014\u00a0meant it had been able to command a premium. But\u00a0exports for the period\u00a0between April and the end of September plunged almost 90% compared to the same six months last year.\n\n\n\nFrom the start, the senior team was\u00a0all too aware of the challenge, according to people familiar with the company.\u00a0 Al-Kaabi\u00a0began marshaling different segments\u00a0of the company, all while\u00a0accelerating efforts to trade and source gas far beyond the Persian Gulf.\u00a0In the meantime, contract managers kept in constant touch with customers\u00a0even when there were no updates, according to people involved in the calls, in an attempt to\u00a0preserve\u00a0the link\u00a0between buyer and trusted long-term supplier.\u00a0\n\n\n\nThe first part of the\u00a0plan was to lean\u00a0on QatarEnergy Trading. Established in 2020, QET has long had a mandate to buy and sell LNG on the spot market and build supply positions outside the country. With prompt prices in Asia surging, the unit began accelerating purchases of American LNG \u2014 not simply to replace lost Qatari supply and keep\u00a0up deliveries, but to sell to buyers at a profit.\u00a0\u00a0\n\n\n\nBangladesh, struggling with\u00a0energy shortages since the war began, was one such client.\u00a0The trading arm, which has a long-term contract with Petrobangla, agreed to deliver shipments to help fill the gap left by Ras Laffan. Under the arrangement, Bangladesh paid a small discount to prevailing spot prices \u2014 driven to sky-high levels by the war \u2014 but the cargoes still sold at roughly twice the price of its much cheaper long-term\u00a0contract.\u00a0\n\n\n\nThe same conversation is playing out across Europe and Asia, with QET hunting down supply and keeping itself in the equation \u2014\u00a0even if market conditions push prices higher. The unit is on track to handle more\u00a0 than 15 million tons of LNG this year, according to a\u00a0person\u00a0familiar with its operations. That\u2019s a fraction of the more than 70 million\u00a0handled last year by Shell Plc, the world\u2019s biggest LNG trader and a benchmark for Qatar\u2019s ambitions, but a\u00a0jump from the annual 10 million tons the company\u00a0estimated\u00a0it was handling\u00a0in the middle of last year.\n\n\n\n\u201cQatarEnergy has what it takes to become a trader,\u201d\u00a0 said Jean-Christian Heintz, a former\u00a0trading executive who\u2019s now an independent consultant at Wideangle LNG. \u201cThey have the talent, the financial reputation and the rationale \u2014\u00a0sourcing replacement volumes to mitigate Hormuz.\u201d\n\n\n\nQatarEnergy is in advanced discussions with export projects in Louisiana and Texas to purchase millions of tons of LNG for years in order to expand its portfolio of supply, according to the people familiar with the matter.\u00a0QET already sources gas from the US Golden Pass facility, primarily owned by QatarEnergy, which began operations this year and has been steadily ramping up output.\u00a0\n\n\n\nThis week, in a rare move, it offered Bangladesh a long-term LNG deal tied to its \u201cinternational portfolio\u201d \u2014\u00a0and not simply Ras Laffan.\n\n\n\n\u201cWe are building our position,\u201d Al-Kaabi told\u00a0the Qatar Economic Forum in New York in September, laying out the company\u2019s ambitious goals for itself. \u201cIn the very near future, we will be the largest LNG trader in the world by far.\u201d\n\n\n\nThe prime aim, however, was still to sell Qatar\u2019s own gas. Even in the early months, the company had tested the water with occasional crossings \u2014\u00a0until the\u00a0LNG tanker\u00a0was attacked in July while traversing Hormuz. The engine room was hit and caught fire.\u00a0Al-Kaabi took\u00a0the incident as his personal\u00a0responsibility\u00a0and suspended plans to increase exports and send more fuel through Hormuz, said\u00a0people familiar with discussions at the time. Another tanker loaded with Qatari gas was struck at the end of that month.\n\n\n\nBut as weeks passed, executives watched neighboring oil producers shipping cargoes through Hormuz, and began to worry that Qatar\u00a0would be left behind.\u00a0To make matters worse, increasing flows from the US were replacing shipments for\u00a0some of its major clients like India, and\u00a0top buyer China was stepping up efforts to try and diversify away from the Gulf.\u00a0\n\n\n\nStorage was also becoming a concern, as the country\u00a0tried to keep the world\u2019s largest LNG export plant\u00a0in working order so that it could rapidly expand if the situation around Hormuz stabilized. Two of its 14 production trains were damaged by the March attack and could take about three years to fix. But that still left 83% of its operational capacity available to resume rapidly, and QatarEnergy had mobilized staff to make repairs within days, navigating around struck facilities with shrapnel still strewn about, according to people with knowledge of the situation.\n\n\n\nTo ensure a rapid\u00a0ramp-up once Hormuz reopened\u00a0\u2014\u00a0LNG need for extremely low temperatures makes restarts slow\u00a0\u2014 Ras Laffan was already producing just enough, sending cargoes to Kuwait every month to allow three to four production trains to keep running at low rates. But exports still needed to pick up, and that meant testing shuttle runs.\n\n\n\nThe first step was to begin recalling the vessels that it had leased out early in the war, when crossings seemed impossible. Top of the list were those aged 15 years or more, according to people familiar with the planning\u00a0\u2014\u00a0tankers for which insurers would charge more manageable premiums, compared to brand new vessels that can cost more than $300 million to replace.\u00a0\n\n\n\nBut there were not enough. Short of the vessels required to meet its\u00a0target \u2014\u00a0loading around a shipment\u00a0a day for delivery as far afield as China and Japan \u2014\u00a0Qatar\u00a0began chartering tankers from third-party LNG shipowners, including Greece\u2019s Maran Gas Maritime Inc., at freight rates about 10 times the market price at the time, according to sources involved in the trade.\n\n\n\nThat left a second problem:\u00a0willing crews. Several countries,\u00a0including the Philippines, have\u00a0pushed back\u00a0against allowing the use of their citizens to ferry cargoes through\u00a0Hormuz. QatarEnergy worked instead\u00a0with recruiters in Indonesia, offering double and sometimes triple the usual monthly pay, plus bonuses for sailing through the strait.\n\n\n\nQatar now needs to manage a final and far more challenging headache \u2014\u00a0the unpredictable nature of crossings and an unstable security situation. Since the attack last week, transits have slowed. All of that will mean different relations with the country\u2019s clients.\n\n\n\n\u00a0\u201cQatar\u2019s ability to demand premium pricing and terms diminished,\u201d said Saul Kavonic, senior energy analyst at MST Marquee.\u00a0\u201cGulf states are rapidly looking to build pipelines and other avenues.\u00a0Qatar is in the most difficult position as they have no avenues to bypass the strait for their LNG.\u201d\n\n\n\nIt is possible that not all customers, for example, will wait for Qatar to ship in sufficient quantities.\u00a0Extended force majeure can eventually give buyers the right to walk away, typically after a prolonged period of canceled deliveries. Some may well seek more flexible terms and conditions, according to people involved in the trade, forcing an LNG powerhouse to consider how far it will go to fit a new reality.\n\n\n\n\u201cThere is no turning back,\u201d said Anne-Sophie Corbeau, a researcher at Columbia University\u2019s Center on Global Energy Policy and former head of gas analysis at BP Plc. \u201cQatarEnergy will have to adapt, either through lower prices, or more flex or a combination of both.\u201d\n\n\n\n\u00a9\u00a02026\u00a0Bloomberg L.P.\n\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\t \n\n\n\t\tSubscribe for Daily Maritime Insights\n\t\tSign up for gCaptain\u2019s newsletter and never miss an update\n \u2014 trusted by our 106,746 members" ], "output": "readability", "pwd": "/data/archive/1792015674.90674", "schema": "ArchiveResult", "start_ts": "2026-10-15T01:27:28.921120+00:00", "status": "succeeded" } ], "screenshot": [], "singlefile": [], "title": [ { "cmd": [ "curl", "--silent", "--location", "--compressed", "--max-time", "120", "--user-agent", "Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/118.0.0.0 Safari/537.36 ArchiveBox/0.7.4 (+https://github.com/ArchiveBox/ArchiveBox/) curl/curl 8.14.1 (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu)", "https://gcaptain.com/qatar-rewrites-its-gas-playbook-with-old-tankers-and-new-tactics/" ], "cmd_version": "curl 8.14.1 (x86_64-pc-linux-gnu)", "end_ts": "2026-10-15T01:27:28.912349+00:00", "index_texts": null, "output": "Qatar Rewrites Its Gas Playbook With Old Tankers and New Tactics", "pwd": "/data/archive/1792015674.90674", "schema": "ArchiveResult", "start_ts": "2026-10-15T01:27:28.882693+00:00", "status": "succeeded" } ], "wget": [ { "cmd": [ "wget", "--no-verbose", "--adjust-extension", "--convert-links", "--force-directories", "--span-hosts", "--no-parent", "-e", "robots=off", "--reject=js,mjs,woff,woff2,ttf,otf,eot,mp4,m4v,mov,webm,ogv,mkv,avi,flv", "--timeout=120", "--restrict-file-names=windows", "--page-requisites", "--user-agent=Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/118.0.0.0 Safari/537.36 ArchiveBox/0.7.4 (+https://github.com/ArchiveBox/ArchiveBox/) wget/GNU Wget 1.21.3", "--compression=auto", "--timestamping", "https://gcaptain.com/qatar-rewrites-its-gas-playbook-with-old-tankers-and-new-tactics/" ], "cmd_version": "GNU Wget 1.21.3", "end_ts": "2026-10-15T01:27:28.871079+00:00", "index_texts": null, "output": "gcaptain.com/qatar-rewrites-its-gas-playbook-with-old-tankers-and-new-tactics/index.html", "pwd": "/data/archive/1792015674.90674", "schema": "ArchiveResult", "start_ts": "2026-10-15T01:27:15.779478+00:00", "status": "succeeded" } ] }, "icons": null, "is_archived": true, "is_static": false, "latest": { "archive_org": null, "dom": null, "favicon": "favicon.ico", "git": null, "media": null, "pdf": null, "screenshot": null, "singlefile": null, "title": "Qatar Rewrites Its Gas Playbook With Old Tankers and New Tactics", "warc": null, "wget": "gcaptain.com/qatar-rewrites-its-gas-playbook-with-old-tankers-and-new-tactics/index.html" }, "link_dir": "/data/archive/1792015674.90674", "newest_archive_date": "2026-10-15T01:27:30.735508+00:00", "num_failures": 0, "num_outputs": 6, "oldest_archive_date": "2026-10-15T01:27:14.749730+00:00", "path": "/qatar-rewrites-its-gas-playbook-with-old-tankers-and-new-tactics/", "schema": "Link", "scheme": "https", "snapshot_id": "27b3ea92-3781-42d8-b3e8-18f9c52aafe8", "sources": [ "/data/sources/1792015674-import.txt" ], "tags": ",pool,escalation,war-wiki", "tags_str": "pool,escalation,war-wiki", "timestamp": "1792015674.90674", "title": "Qatar Rewrites Its Gas Playbook With Old Tankers and New Tactics", "updated": "2026-10-15T01:27:14.749326+00:00", "updated_date": "2026-10-15 01:27", "url": "https://gcaptain.com/qatar-rewrites-its-gas-playbook-with-old-tankers-and-new-tactics/" }