Bahrain’s energy connectivity paradox: Networked resilience or deeper dependence?

On 9 March 2026, Bahrain’s Bapco declared force majeure after an attack disrupted operations at its Sitra refinery complex. The incident came amid the US-Israeli war with Iran, as energy infrastructure and shipping routes across the Gulf were drawn directly into the conflict. Reuters reported that Bahrain was among the Gulf producers affected as the war disrupted regional energy flows.

For Bahrain, this was more than a temporary refining disruption. It exposed a deeper reality: energy security cannot be separated from security geography.

Bahrain’s role as host to the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet and its 2020 normalisation with Israel under the Abraham Accords are more than diplomatic facts. They embed the island deeply within the Gulf’s regional security architecture.

The same architecture that provides Manama with external protection and deterrence can also generate geopolitical exposure in a regional war. Sitra demonstrated that, for a small Gulf state, strategic alignment and energy security cannot be treated as separate domains.

Large capacity, concentrated vulnerability

Bapco’s modernisation project raised Sitra’s refining capacity to 405,000 barrels per day, a 42 per cent increase. Yet much of this enlarged refining system relies on the 118-kilometre AB4 pipeline linking Sitra directly to Saudi Aramco’s Abqaiq facilities. The pipeline has a normal operating capacity of around 350,000 barrels per day.

AB4 is therefore more than a pipeline. It is the dominant feedstock artery of Bahrain’s refining system and a critical concentration risk in the kingdom’s energy architecture.

The asymmetry lies in adjustment costs. A prolonged disruption would place one of Bahrain’s most important industrial assets under immediate pressure. Saudi Arabia, operating within a vastly larger production, processing and export system, possesses considerably greater scope to redirect crude flows.

For Manama, connectivity creates efficiency but not necessarily leverage. When alternatives are limited, an efficient cross-border connection can become a source of strategic vulnerability.

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LNG: diversification without escape from geography

Bahrain has sought to broaden its supply options through its LNG import terminal near Khalifa Bin Salman Port. The facility, commissioned in 2020 and used for LNG imports from 2025, has capacity of around 800 million standard cubic feet per day.

This gives Bahrain access to a wider pool of gas suppliers. But it does not free the country from geography.

The terminal lies inside the Gulf. LNG cargoes reaching Bahrain therefore remain exposed to conditions in and around the Strait of Hormuz. That vulnerability became unmistakable during the 2026 war. By early March, traffic through Hormuz had been heavily disrupted and maritime war-risk premiums had risen by more than 1,000 per cent in some cases.

The distinction is crucial: supplier diversification is not the same as risk diversification.

Bahrain’s LNG terminal broadens its supplier base in normal conditions, but it does not offer a geopolitical escape route during a Gulf-wide military crisis.

Electricity: regional insurance, not independence

Bahrain is also connected to its neighbours through the GCC electricity grid. This interconnection provides an additional layer of resilience, but its role should not be overstated.

Bahrain’s peak electricity demand reached 4,017 MW in 2025, while total generation capacity stood at 5,044 MW.

Regional interconnection can provide emergency support and facilitate electricity exchange, but it cannot substitute for domestic generation. More importantly, if a crisis affects several Gulf states simultaneously, the same network designed to distribute resilience may also transmit scarcity.

Connectivity therefore reduces some forms of vulnerability while leaving others intact.

Gas powers more than Bahrain’s lights

Bahrain’s gas vulnerability also extends well beyond the public electricity system.

Aluminium Bahrain, or Alba, is the world’s largest single-site aluminium smelter and produced 1.623 million tonnes in 2025.

Aluminium smelting is exceptionally electricity-intensive because electrolysis drives the reduction process. Alba therefore operates three dedicated power plants with combined generating capacity of around 4,200 MW.

A prolonged gas-supply constraint would consequently threaten more than electricity availability. It could restrict production at the crown jewel of Bahrain’s non-oil industrial export economy.

For Bahrain, energy security is therefore also industrial security.

From refining to trading

Bahrain is simultaneously attempting to move further along the energy value chain. In January 2026, Bapco Energies and TotalEnergies launched BxT Trading, an equally owned joint venture backed by flows from Bapco’s refinery.

The venture aims to broaden access to global markets while developing capabilities in trading, pricing, market analysis and risk management.

This should not be read as evidence that Bahrain has suddenly become a regional energy-trading hub. Its strategic importance lies instead in capability acquisition through partnership.

If those capabilities become embedded within Bahraini institutions, BxT could expand Manama’s commercial room for manoeuvre. If expertise and market access remain externally dependent, however, the arrangement may simply add another layer to the kingdom’s network of reliance.

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The real test of energy diplomacy

Bahrain’s Energy Transition Plan targets 20 per cent clean energy by 2035, a reduction of more than 30 per cent in natural-gas consumption by 2040 and more than 45 per cent of energy demand supplied from clean sources by then.

But Bahrain’s experience suggests that, for small states, energy security cannot be measured simply by the number of pipelines, terminals, cables or partnerships connected to them.

What matters is whether those connections are genuinely independent, whether alternative suppliers remain accessible during crisis and whether infrastructure creates real strategic room for manoeuvre.

Bahrain is not escaping dependence. It is diversifying the channels through which dependence operates.

For small states, connectivity is not an inherent shield. When pipelines, electricity networks and maritime supply routes remain exposed to the same geopolitical theatre, a larger network may diversify suppliers without truly diversifying risk.

The real test of Bahrain’s energy diplomacy is therefore not how many networks connect to Manama, but how many genuinely independent routes remain available when crisis arrives.

The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.