Just northeast of this coastal city, the highway ends where guards block entry to one of China’s strategic oil reserves. Behind a gate, mountains hide the site. As obscure as the view of Dalian’s oil-reserve tanks is the outlook for China’s oil demand. When benchmark oil prices tumbled last year—falling by more than half within six months—China rushed to buy. The drop in price suddenly made it more affordable to fill stockpiles that the government and oil companies have set up to increase energy security. The effort gave a boost to global demand, contributing to 9.5% growth in China’s crude-oil imports last year: tens of millions of additional barrels from the Middle East, Russia and elsewhere. That buying has made the task of assessing true Chinese demand […]