Six contractors submitted commercial bids to Abu Dhabi Oil Refining Company (Takreer) for the front-end engineering and design (feed) tender for the flare gas recovery systems at the Ruwais and the Abu Dhabi refineries on 3 April.

Bidders had to resubmit technical bids in March after Takreer decided to extend the scope of the project to cover the Abu Dhabi refinery (MEED 04:03:11).

The six bidding contractors are:

• CH2M Hill (US)
• Jacobs Engineering Group (US)
• Mustang Engineering (US)
• Saipem (Italy)
• Technip (France)
• WorleyParsons (Australia)

The value of the contract is estimated at about $3m by sources at the bidding companies.

The contract is due to be awarded soon. “They need to go to the tender committee, they meet once a week or once every two weeks, so maybe by early April we will know something,” says a source at a bidding company.

The project is intended to help Takreer to reduce carbon emissions at its refineries, as well as to recover gas from the refining process to use in power generation.

The project includes adding vapour headers, liquid ring compressors, operating liquid coolers, three-phase separators and flare stacks to the refineries.

Interest in the feed contract was strong, with bidders hoping to position themselves for the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract, due to be awarded in the second quarter of 2012.

“All of the companies are very interested in this small job, as there is a link with the EPC,” said a source at another bidding company.