UAE oil exports hit record 5.3 million barrels per day in September, IEA figures show

The International Energy Agency estimates UAE oil supply hit a record 5.3 million barrels per day in September, Bloomberg reported on October 14, with Fujairah port loading a record 2.62 million barrels per day. The numbers read like a triumph — until the storage tanks are checked.

Fujairah is the port the UAE built specifically to keep its oil flowing without depending on the Strait of Hormuz, and after at least 19 attacks on the facility since the war began, loadings have recovered. But an assessment of the UAE's oil and gas system dated October 22, sent to Zero Hedge by analyst Karl Miller, finds the recovery is crude-only. The UAE's fuel reserves have been drained to about a third of their prewar level, its gas business remains impaired, and its petrochemical plants are short of feedstock.

The record exports are being drawn down from inventory, not produced from intact infrastructure. US Energy Information Administration figures show UAE crude and condensate production fell from about 4.0 million barrels per day at the start of 2026 to an average of 2.4 million during March through May — a 40 percent decline — after the Ruwais refining complex caught fire on March 10 and shut down. The Shah sour-gas plant burned on March 16; the Habshan gas complex was hit on April 3 and again on April 8; Borouge's petrochemical plant was damaged on April 5; the Emirates Global Aluminium smelter went offline on March 28. In the week of March 16, Fujairah loadings fell to 440,000 barrels per day, and after a strike on May 4, refined-product exports essentially stopped for a month, with exactly one product tanker leaving before June 1.

The corporate accounts confirm the gap between the headline and the system. ADNOC Gas's second-quarter results showed domestic gas production down 32.5 percent year over year, export liquids down 54.5 percent, LNG sales down about 71 percent, revenue down 39 percent and net income down 52 percent — roughly $2.3 billion lost in a single quarter. The company nonetheless reported its assets were 99.9 percent available, better than a year earlier, while actual utilization fell from 80 percent to 54 percent. Habshan's gas supply was 85 percent restored as of August 10; Borouge had repaired its plant by the end of June.

For years the UAE marketed itself as a stable, diversified safe haven insulated from the region's chaos. The record export figures now circulating through the war premium are the sound of that inventory being sold off.