Abstract

Monitoring maritime oil flow is important for the security and stability of energy transportation, especially since the “21st Century Maritime Silk Road” (MSR) concept was proposed. The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) provides public annual oil flow data of maritime oil chokepoints, which do not reflect subtle changes. Therefore, we used the automatic identification system (AIS) data from 2014 to 2016 and applied the proposed technical framework to four chokepoints (the straits of Malacca, Hormuz, Bab el-Mandeb, and the Cape of Good Hope) within the MSR region. The deviations and the statistical values of the annual oil flow from the results estimated by the AIS data and the EIA data, as well as the general direction of the oil flow, demonstrate the reliability of the proposed framework. Further, the monthly and seasonal cycles of the oil flows through the four chokepoints differ significantly in terms of the value and trend but generally show an upward trend. Besides, the first trough of the oil flow through the straits of Hormuz and Malacca corresponds with the military activities of the U.S. in 2014, while the second is owing to the outbreak of the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome in 2015.

Highlights

  • “The Belt and Road Initiative”, comprising the “Silk Road Economic Belt” and “21st Century Maritime Silk Road” (MSR), was proposed by China to promote economic trade and deepen the connection between China and its associated countries [1,2,3,4]

  • Statistical methods for the ship traffic volume are divided into two categories: statistics based on imaging systems and statistics based on laser sensors

  • For the statistics based on laser sensors [18,19], a laser beam is emitted to the target by a laser-ranging sensor, and it is received by the photoelectric element after being reflected by the target

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Summary

Introduction

“The Belt and Road Initiative”, comprising the “Silk Road Economic Belt” and “21st Century Maritime Silk Road” (MSR), was proposed by China to promote economic trade and deepen the connection between China and its associated countries [1,2,3,4]. The aforementioned methods can provide statistics regarding ship traffic volume, the imaging and laser sensors are only deployed near the port and can only obtain statistical information near the port They present a common problem regarding the lack of load information in the calculation of the oil flow. We calculated and analyzed the oil flow through the MOCs, making available statistical data for ensuring the security and stability of oil transportation within the MSR and its surrounding region. Voyage-related information refers to the information that must be manually inputted before each voyage This includes the details of the “estimated arrival time”, “destination”, and “draft.” Such information is generally reported to countries along the way via ship-shore data exchange

Destination
Study Method
Extraction of Ship Point Pairs
Data Preprocessing
Events Corresponding to the Troughs in the Oil Flow
Findings
Conclusions

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