The Panama Canal is facing a new round of “transit crisis” due to the combination of the continuing escalation of the situation in the Middle East and the strong El Niño phenomenon. Due to the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, demand for energy transportation from the US Gulf of Mexico to the Asian market has risen sharply, and the auction price of a single pass quota for the Panama Canal has recently soared to a record 5.3 million US dollars. However, the canal basin experiences an El Niño-related drought every 2 to 7 years, which has forced the Panamanian government to continuously lower the average number of daily navigation vessels and ship drains since September. Faced with the upper limit of traffic capacity that is difficult to break through in the short term, the Panamanian government has launched medium- to long-term emergency projects such as the Indio River Reservoir in an attempt to find a breakthrough at the root cause.

The Panama Canal is facing a new round of “transit crisis” due to the combination of the continuing escalation of the situation in the Middle East and the strong El Niño phenomenon. Due to the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, demand for energy transportation from the US Gulf of Mexico to the Asian market has risen sharply, and the auction price of a single pass quota for the Panama Canal has recently soared to a record 5.3 million US dollars. However, the canal basin experiences an El Niño-related drought every 2 to 7 years, which has forced the Panamanian government to continuously lower the average number of daily navigation vessels and ship drains since September. Faced with the upper limit of traffic capacity that is difficult to break through in the short term, the Panamanian government has launched medium- to long-term emergency projects such as the Indio River Reservoir in an attempt to find a breakthrough at the root cause.