Abu Dhabi’s International Petroleum Investment Company (Ipic) has completed the front-end engineering & design (feed) phase on its Fujairah refinery project.

The feed work on the proposed 200,000 barrel-a-day (b/d) facility was carried out by France’s Technip, which was awarded the contract in the third quarter of 2012.

The project management consultant (PMC) for the feed phase was Stone & Webster, which Technip acquired from the US-based Shaw Group in 2012.

Ipic is now expected to tender the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) packages for the refinery project later this year.

The state-owned group is expected to invest $3.5bn on the downstream facility and wants to complete the project by 2017. Earlier this year, Ipic appointed the UK’s HSBC as the financial adviser for the scheme.

The refinery is the first stage of a two-phase project to establish an integrated refinery and petrochemicals complex at Fujairah on the UAE’s east coast. The second phase will cover a proposed olefins plant and associated facilities to be tendered at a later date.

The Fujairah refinery is strategically placed as it allows the UAE to export refined oil products bypassing the Strait of Hormuz at the entrance to the Gulf.