Award nears on QNCC expansion

19 March 2004
France's FCBis the frontrunner for the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract on the Umm Bab cement plant expansion, having submitted the clear low bid for the estimated QR 500 million ($137 million) project. One other group - made up of Denmark's FL Smidthand Egypt's Orascom Construction Industries- has priced the Qatar National Cement Company (QNCC)contract (MEED 30:1:04).

QNCC is due to hold in late March final negotiations with the bidders and expects to award the contract in the first week of April. The two-year contract calls for the addition of a 1 million-tonne-a-year (t/y) cement line, which will increase capacity at Umm Bab to 2.4 million t/y. The project consultant is Belgium's Basse Sambre Eri.

The expansion is being carried out to meet rapidly rising local demand for cement. Over the coming five years, more than $30,000 million is expected to be invested in energy projects and non-oil infrastructure.

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