The US Dow Chemical is evaluating bids for the construction contract to build the polyethylene package at the $20bn Sadara Chemical Complex at Jubail in Saudi Arabia.

The company, a 50:50 joint-venture partner in the complex with Saudi Aramco, was awarded the engineering, procurement, construction and management (EPCM) contract for the package due to it supplying the technology.

Dow has no specialist construction arm in the kingdom, so will only carry out the engineering of the technology and the large-scale procurement. This leaves the basic procurement and construction to be carried out by a contractor and an award is expected in January.

“This offers a good opportunity for a local contractor to pick up some work at Sadara,” says a source familiar with the contract. “The vast majority of the large international contractors are not bidding due to the relatively small size of the deal on offer. Obviously, Dow would not let anyone close to the engineering, as it would jeopardise their intellectual property rights to the technology.”  

The package is worth about $1.3bn in total, but sources estimate the construction package released by Dow is in the $100m-$200m bracket.

As well as providing technology for the polyethylene package, Dow is also planning to build a $100m reverse osmosis element manufacturing plant next to the Sadara complex (MEED 5:8:11).  

Sadara is starting to make more awards at its complex with several expected to be made in the weeks leading up to the end of January.

Sadara Chemical Company will have a capacity of about 8 million tonnes a year (t/y) and will be constructed at Jubail Industrial City 2 in the Eastern Province of the kingdom.

The complex will produce several speciality chemicals aimed at pushing Saudi Arabia’s petrochemicals industry further downstream.