Saudi Aramco is fast-tracking the bid evaluations for engineering, procurement and construction contracts for the $6bn-plus Wasit gas development programme and should have approved the award of contracts by December.

A source tells MEED that the prices from the winning contractors need the Aramco board to give authorisation before the successful bidders can be announced.   

“For a project this size there is a procedure in place that has to be followed,” the source says. “But if the evaluations are completed early and the budget is approved in the first or second week of December, the winning bidders could be announced before the end of the year.”

No frontrunners have emerged for the onshore packages of the Wasit scheme, which indicates that Aramco has not sent out any notifications yet.

“Everyone is being quiet about Wasit,” says a source from one of the bidding contractors. “Usually rumours about who has the lowest bid are circulating by now, but I haven’t heard anything.”    

The four EPC contracts are for the main processing facilities at Wasit, on Saudi Arabia’s Gulf coast, which will be capable of handling 1.7 billion cubic feet a day of gas and 4,800 tonnes a day (t/d) of sulphur (MEED 12:11:10).

They cover the main inlet and gas processing facilities; a power co-generation unit; sulphur recovery facilities; utilities and a natural gas liquids (NGL) fractionating column.