* CERAWeek organizers informed of Nasser's withdrawal, source says
* Aramco faces biggest challenges since COVID-19 and 2019 attacks
* Kuwait state oil firm KPC's CEO to attend virtually, source says
* Abu Dhabi wealth fund Mubadala executives unlikely to attend, source says
By Maha El Dahan and Yousef Saba
DUBAI, March 22 (Reuters) - Saudi Aramco Chief Executive Amin Nasser has cancelled his planned appearance at the CERAWeek energy conference in Houston to remain in Saudi Arabia because of the Iran conflict, an industry source told Reuters.
Nasser, who has been CEO of the world's top oil exporter for more than a decade, is usually one of the headline speakers at the conference, one of the energy industry's biggest events.
CERAWeek, organised by S&P Global, which begins on Monday, draws top executives, government officials, and policymakers from around the world to discuss global energy market outlook.
Nasser's withdrawal highlights the scale of the challenge he faces in dealing with the Iran crisis.
He will also not provide a recorded video message for the CERAWeek conference, the source said, adding that the event's organizers had been notified.
The conflict, now in its fourth week, has killed more than 2,000 people, upended global markets and spurred Iranian retaliatory strikes that have effectively shut the Strait of Hormuz and targeted Gulf energy infrastructure, including Aramco's.
U.S. President Donald Trump and Iran have threatened to escalate the war, targeting energy and fuel facilities in the Gulf. Trump on Saturday threatened to bomb Iran's power plants if Tehran did not fully reopen the Strait, through which a fifth of the world's oil supplies normally flow.
Sheikh Nawaf Al-Sabah, CEO of state-owned Kuwait Petroleum Corporation, will also not attend the Houston gathering but will join a Tuesday session at the conference virtually from Kuwait, a separate source said.
ENERGY INSTALLATIONS UNDER ATTACK
Aramco is facing its biggest crisis since the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2019 attacks on Aramco's Abqaiq and Khurais facilities that temporarily knocked out more than half of Saudi crude output.
During a March 10 earnings call, Nasser told reporters there would be "catastrophic consequences" for the world's oil markets if the Iran war continues to disrupt the Strait of Hormuz.
To bypass the strait, Aramco is piping millions of barrels per day (bpd) of crude from its east coast to its west coast. It has cut oil output by about 2 million bpd from two fields, Reuters has reported.
The alternative route means tankers load at the Red Sea port of Yanbu, which temporarily stopped loadings last week, sending prices surging, after a ballistic missile interception and drone strike at an adjacent refinery.
The SAMREF refinery, an Aramco-Exxon joint venture, was struck by a drone on March 19, when Iran targeted energy installations across the Gulf - including Kuwait's - in response to Israel's strikes on its South Pars gas field.
That wave of attacks hit Qatar's Ras Laffan liquefied natural gas complex, with QatarEnergy's chief telling Reuters 17% of Qatar's LNG capacity would be offline for up to five years.
KEY ABU DHABI EXECUTIVES
Abu Dhabi wealth fund Mubadala is unlikely to have any representatives at the event, a source familiar with the matter said.
It was not immediately clear if Sultan Al Jaber, CEO of the UAE's oil company ADNOC, would attend in person. He is listed as a speaker on the event website. ADNOC did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
At last year's conference, Jaber said it was time to "make energy great again," mirroring Trump's Make America Great Again slogan while pledging large investments in the U.S. by ADNOC's international investments arm XRG. Nasser last year told CERAWeek there was more of a chance of Elvis speaking than current energy transition plans away from fossil fuels succeeding.
(Reporting by Maha El Dahan and Yousef Saba. Writing by Yousef Saba. Editing by Jane Merriman)
