China has become a new oil power, despite lacking giant fields

China has become a new oil power without possessing the giant oil fields associated with traditional producers. After six months of war stopped oil flows from the Persian Gulf, on which China can scarcely do without, the country has emerged in a surprising position.

Iraq, Kuwait and the Emirates have their oil reserves underground, in vast fields. China’s reserves, by contrast, are described more strikingly: its oil is in cans, meaning enormous storage tanks.

That stockpiled capacity has given China a new role in the disrupted oil landscape, even though it lacks the underground “oil lakes” of the major Gulf producers.