伊朗的石油基础设施正在中东持续升级的冲突中心被推到风口浪尖，但以色列对伊朗能源设施的袭击也将直接影响中国。
拜登总统在周四表示，美国正讨论以色列可能打击伊朗庞大石油部门的可能性。
他的这番言论已经导致全球市场上的油价大幅上涨，尽管多数国家因为对德黑兰的制裁而避免了购买伊朗的石油。
然而，与中国不同。它是唯一从伊朗进口大量石油的国家。中国购买超过90%的伊朗石油出口。
中国几乎三分之二的石油需求依靠从世界各地进口满足。如果丢失来自伊朗的供应，那么中国会进一步转向全球市场寻求更多的能源需求。
对于伊朗而言，对中国的出口是其财政资金的关键来源。该国每月向中国销售的大约20亿美元的石油代表了其经济产出至少5%的收入。这部分资金支持着伊朗政府，并为伊朗自身进口提供了现金。
伊朗出口几乎一半的原油产量，其余部分用于国内需求。中国没有购买的部分伊朗石油出口主要用于向叙利亚和委内瑞拉等几乎破产、几乎没有支付燃料费用能力的两个盟友提供经济援助或以物易物的形式输送。
来自伊朗的石油价格便宜，并且以其较高的折扣售出到世界市场，因为制裁使得买家稀少。这些原油的价格甚至低于俄罗斯的原油。尽管中国、印度及其他发展中国家继续从遭受乌克兰战争打击的俄罗斯购买石油，但实际上除了中国之外很少有国家愿意购买伊朗石油。
中国经济运行依赖大量的能源输入。它是世界上最大的石油进口国和仅次于美国的第二大石油消费国。
然而，与中国对石油的依赖程度相比有所减少。在40%的能源使用中，美国以石油为主导；而在中国的整体能源供应体系中，仅占比约20%。据休斯敦莱斯大学布什学院中国能源研究员盖博瑞·科林斯指出。
目前，在中国的汽车销售中有超过一半是电动汽车或插电式混合动力车。中国汽车主要通过燃烧煤炭来获取能源——这是全球最大的煤产国和消费国，以及太阳能电池板和风力涡轮机。其中大部分来自中国的石油进口用于化工行业，这是世界上最大的化学产业领域，或者为运输卡车提供柴油燃料。
据维也纳Kpler公司高级炼油与石油产品分析师安顿·帕夫洛夫估计，中国从伊朗的石油进口量约占其总石油进口量的大约15%。俄罗斯是为中国供应石油的最大国家；但中国也大量从伊拉克、科威特、沙特阿拉伯、阿拉伯联合酋长国和安哥拉等国采购原油。
石油输出国组织成员国的日均产量比其全部产能少五百万桶。这个组织是由沙特阿拉伯领导的产油国卡特尔，故意限制生产量以维持价格相对稳定。如果中国无法从伊朗购买其通常的进口量——大约每天一百万到150万桶—那么可能会找到替代国家，例如伊朗邻国可能愿意向中国提供。
因此，在其他各国增加供应的情况下，对伊朗石油出口中断导致中国经济受到的影响将极小。据能源专家说，“伊朗石油出口中任何可能出现的中断都会被中国其他来源的供应快速填补。”
过去几年来，中国一直在扩大其原油储备容量。随着中国房地产业放缓和大批建筑工人被重新调配到建造储油罐工作中，这一情况得到了缓解。
长期猜测显示，中国的紧急储备正在迅速增加，以防与中国台湾的潜在冲突导致所有海运进口中断的情况发生。根据估算，当前中国自身的石油储量能够等于其三个月的所有进口量以及来自伊朗两年的进口量，这为伊朗供应中断提供了缓冲余地。
“如果只有30天的时间窗口，那么对中国经济的影响就像一道减速带一样微不足道。”新加坡大宗商品分析师亚历克斯·特纳伍尔这样评论说。
中国主要关注的是以色列可能袭击伊朗石油基础设施会带来的直接后果，并非是否会发生冲突。专家表示，至少20%的世界石油和中国大量进口的石油通过霍尔木兹海峡向伊朗海域航行，这是从波斯湾到阿拉伯海的主要通道。OPEC每天剩余五百万桶的产能都依赖该海峡出口。
如果以色列削弱了伊朗出口石油的能力，那么其中东竞争对手可能会利用对中国石油出口的增长作为筹码。然而，伊朗可以通过导弹袭击封锁霍尔木兹海峡来阻止它们。
沙特阿拉伯为了部分生产绕过了霍尔木兹海峡，在红海建立了管道设施。但如今这条水道也因为来自伊朗支持的也门胡塞反叛者的攻击变得危险重重。
从全球角度来看，“关注重点不在打击产生的影响，而在伊朗可能采取的反应”，盖博瑞·科林斯说。
澳大利亚经纪公司Pepperstone伦敦分公司的大宗商品专家迈克尔·布朗补充说道：“这才是国际社会的主要担忧所在。”
新闻来源：www.nytimes.com
原文地址：How an Israeli Strike on Iran’s Oil Sector Would Impact China
新闻日期：2024-10-04
原文摘要：
Iran’s oil infrastructure has been pushed to the center of the escalating conflict in the Middle East, but an Israeli strike on Iran’s energy facilities would also affect China directly. On Thursday, President Biden said the United States was “in discussion” about the possibility that Israel might strike Iran’s vast oil sector. His comments have already sent oil prices sharply higher in global markets, even though most countries shun Iran’s oil because of international sanctions on Tehran. China is the exception. It buys more than 90 percent of Iran’s oil exports. China relies on imports from around the world for almost three-quarters of its oil consumption. The loss of supply from Iran would have China turning to global markets for even more of its energy needs. For Iran, exports to China are a vital source of funds. The country’s roughly $2 billion a month in oil sales to China represent at least 5 percent of Iran’s entire economic output. They bankroll the Iranian government and provide the cash that Iran needs to pay for its own imports. Iran exports nearly half of its oil production and uses the rest for its own domestic needs. The sliver of Iran’s oil exports that China does not purchase is shipped mainly as economic assistance or barter to two nearly bankrupt allies, Syria and Venezuela, that have little money to pay for fuel. Oil from Iran is cheap, and sold at sizable discounts to world prices because sanctions have left so few buyers. Oil from Iran sells for even less than oil from Russia. While China, India and some developing countries continue to buy Russian oil despite Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, practically no one except China is willing to purchase Iranian oil. China needs to buy a lot of energy to keep its economy going. It is the world’s biggest oil importer and the second-largest oil consumer behind the United States. Yet China has done much to limit its overall reliance on oil. While oil accounts for 40 percent of energy used in the United States, it is only about 20 percent of China’s overall energy supply, said Gabriel Collins, a China energy researcher at Rice University’s Baker Institute for Public Policy in Houston. Slightly more than half the cars sold in China now are battery electric or plug-in gasoline-electric hybrid cars. China generates the energy to power those cars mainly by burning coal — China is the world’s dominant producer and consumer of coal — and with solar panels and wind turbines. Much of China’s oil imports is used for the country’s chemical industry, which is the world’s largest, or to refine the diesel that powers trucks. An estimated 15 percent of China’s oil imports comes from Iran, according to Andon Pavlov, senior refining and oil products analyst at Kpler, a firm in Vienna that specializes in tracking Iran’s oil shipments. Russia is China’s single largest supplier of oil, but China also buys a lot from Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Angola. Members of the Organization of Petroleum-Exporting Countries produce as much as five million barrels per day of oil less than their full capacity. The group, a cartel of oil producers led by Saudi Arabia, churns out less than it could, so as to keep prices fairly high. If China were unable to buy its usual amount from Iran — about one million to 1.5 million barrels per day — it might find Iran’s neighbors happy to supply it instead. As a result, the damage to China’s economy from even a long-term interruption of oil from Iran would be minimal, provided that other countries stepped up their shipments, oil experts said. “Any interruptions to Iranian oil exports would probably be quickly replaced with increases in China’s other sources of supply,” said Roger Fouquet, an energy specialist at the National University of Singapore. China has been expanding its oil reserves over the past several years. As home building has slowed with the country’s housing market crash, many construction workers have been redeployed to making oil storage tanks. Analysts have long guessed that China is swiftly increasing reserves in preparation for a possible conflict with Taiwan, which could result in a disruption of all of mainland China’s seaborne imports. But China’s reserves, now estimated to equal more than three months of the country’s entire oil imports and two years of China’s imports from Iran, would provide a cushion in case of an interruption of Iran’s supplies. “If it’s 30 days of madness, China would glide over that like it’s a speed bump,” said Alex Turnbull, a commodities analyst in Singapore. The big question for China is not whether Israel might strike at Iran’s oil infrastructure, but how Iran would respond, according to experts. At least 20 percent of the world’s oil, and an even larger share of China’s oil imports, travels on ships past Iran’s shores through the Strait of Hormuz, which connects the Persian Gulf to the Arabian Sea. Most of OPEC’s five million barrels a day of excess capacity lies in oil fields that need to export through the Strait of Hormuz. If Israel were to disable Iran’s ability to export oil, Iran’s rivals in the region could cash in by stepping up their exports to China. But Iran could stop them by using missiles to halt tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz. Saudi Arabia has tried to bypass the Strait of Hormuz for part of its production by building pipelines to the Red Sea instead. But that waterway is now also dangerous because of attacks from Yemen by Houthi rebels backed by Iran. For China, “it’s not so much what the impact of the strike is,” Mr. Collins said, “but what is the impact of Iran’s response?” Michael Brown, a commodities specialist in the London office of Pepperstone, an Australian brokerage, added: “That’s the big concern from a global perspective.”
