Dubai’s state-owned Emirates National Oil Company (Enoc) has received commercial bids from international companies for the contract to expand its Jebel Ali refinery, according to sources familiar with the project.

Engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract prices were submitted on 5 May for the estimated $1bn project.

The brownfield project will add 20,000 barrels a day (b/d) to the refinery’s existing capacity of 120,000 b/d to help meet rising domestic fuel demand.

Several companies submitted commercial EPC bids for the project including South Korea’s Samsung Engineering and France-based Technip.

Technical EPC bids were submitted in January. The companies vying for the tender at the technical bid phase were thought include:

• JGC (Japan)
• Petrofac (UK)
• Samsung Engineering (South Korea)
• Technip (France)
• Tecnicas Reunidas (Spain)
• Tecnimont (Italy)

Enoc is expected to award the EPC contract in the third quarter of 2016 after assessing the commercial bids.

The refinery currently has two trains of condensate. Enoc plans to add two new processing units – jet and diesel hydrotreaters, and an isomerisation unit – that will lead to the production of Euro V grade products such as high-octane gasoline, low-sulphur jet fuel and ultra-low sulphur diesel.

The front-end engineering and design (feed) study has been completed by US-based KBR, which won the contract for the study in March 2014.

Established in 1999, the refinery processes condensate to produce refined products such as naphtha, jet fuel, reformate, diesel oil, fuel oil and liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) for local and export markets.