There is a lot of activity in Vietnam’s oil and gas sector on the back of the closure of the Strait of Hormuz. Despite this newfound motivation, however, it is only one piece of a much more complicated puzzle.
Petrovietnam has opened bidding for offshore oil and gas exploration rights in Block 17 of Vietnam’s Cuu Long Basin, it said in a statement on its website.
This is in line with efforts to boost domestic oil and gas exploration and production as the Iran war continues, disrupting global energy supplies.
Indeed, Vietnam’s biggest refinery normally runs on Kuwaiti crude, of which imports fell to zero last month. Other sources have been found, but prices are up across the board, and even at full capacity, Vietnam’s two refineries are not enough to supply all the fuel it needs.
This has highlighted a core vulnerability in Vietnam’s recent, rapid economic growth — its thirst for fuel has grown exponentially, but it has become increasingly dependent on imported fuel.
Vietnam’s oil and gas industry development, however, has been limited by more than just motivation.
Oil production fell, on average, 6 percent a year between 2014 and 2024, with natural gas production over the same period declining at an average rate of 4.7 percent a year, according to the Energy Institute’s 2025 Statistical Review of World Energy.
This has been on account of a range of factors.
Spain’s Repsol abandoned an exploration project in 2018 after the Vietnamese government was reportedly pressured by the Chinese government to halt the project, which fell within China’s nine-dash line claim over the area.
Conversely, a gas project being developed by ExxonMobil has been delayed after five power plants that were to be developed to buy the gas it produced were put on hold until 2028
Chevron also exited a project in 2015 after it failed to reach an agreement on gas prices with PetroVietnam.
That is to say, despite this newfound motivation, it is only one piece of a much more complicated puzzle.