South Korea’s Samsung Engineering has been awarded two contracts totaling more than $3.5bn by the refining arm of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc Refining).

The first contract, worth $3.1bn, will involve Samsung Engineering carrying out engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) works for a crude oil processing flexibility project at Adnoc Refining’s Ruwais refinery complex.

Scheduled to be completed by the end of 2022, this project will enable Adnoc’s Ruwais Refinery-West complex to process up to 420,000 barrels a day (b/d) of crude from its Upper Zakum offshore field, or similar crude types.

Adnoc says the objective of this project is to allow the company “to extract greater value from its crude resources” by sparing larger quantities of its higher-priced, premium crude grade Murban for exports.

The second contract, worth $473m, is for the EPC of a Waste Heat Recovery Project at Ruwais refinery.

The project is scheduled for completion by the end of 2023 and will generate an additional 230MW of electricity for sale and 62,400 cubic metres of water daily by capturing waste heat, currently vented into the atmosphere, by upgrading four giant gas turbines with closed-cycle power generation technology.

“The project will play a significant role in reducing the environmental impact of ADNOC’s refining and power operations, whilst improving energy efficiency,” Adnoc said in its statement.

The contracts were signed in Abu Dhabi in the presence of visiting South Korean President Moon Jae-in and Sultan al-Jaber, UAE Minister of State and Adnoc’s group chief executive.

In line with its renewed policy of implementing In-Country Value (ICV), Adnoc said it had evaluated all bids submitted for both the projects carefully on the localisation component.

Adnoc is investing in new downstream projects to grow its refining capability and expand its petrochemical production three-fold to 14.4 million tonnes per annum by 2025.

Planned projects include a world scale, mixed liquid feedstock Naphtha cracker, as well as investments in new refinery capacity. As a result of the planned expansions in its downstream business, Adnoc will create one of the world’s largest integrated refining and petrochemical complexes at Ruwais, located in Abu Dhabi’s Al-Dhafra region.