Saudi Arabia’s Acwa Power has submitted the lowest bid for the planned Al-Dur 2 independent water and power project (IWPP).

The commercial envelopes were opened on 30 August after the client had completed evaluation and clarifications of the technical submissions. At the bid opening, the consortium led by Saudi Arabia’s Acwa Power, submitted a power tariff of BD12.99735 per megawatt hour (MWh), and a water tariff of BD0.26352 per cubic metre (cm).

The other bidding group, led by Japan’s Sumitomo submitted a power tariff of BD13.0499/MWh, and a desalination tariff of BD0.3768/cm.

At the bid opening, the client read out the first contract year tariff for power and water and not the Hourly Equivalent Payment (HEP), which represents hourly equivalent payment based on both power and water dispatch.

For the first year tariff, bids were calculated for a gas price of $4 per million British thermal units (mmbtu). For the rest of the 19 years, under the proposed 20-year power purchase agreement (PPA), the fuel price used for the tariffs will be $8/mmbtu.

The bidders had submitted proposals on 27 June. The full bidding consortiums are:

• Acwa Power (Saudi Arabia) / Mitsui (Japan) / Al-Moayyed Contracting (local) EPC: Siemens (Germany) and Sepco 3 (China)
• Sumitomo (Japan) / GIC (Local) / Kepco (South Korea) / Posco Energy (South Korea) / EPC: Doosan (South Korea).

The planned Al-Dur 2 project will have a capacity of 1,500MW and a desalination component of 50 million imperial gallons a day (MIGD).

Under the proposed contract, the work will involve the design, procurement, construction and commissioning of the plant, gas connection facilities and the seawater intake/outfall facilities. The contract will also cover the operation and maintenance of the plant and the seawater intake/outfall facilities.

EWA will purchase the power under a 20-year power purchase agreement (PPA), with the power capacity due to come online by June 2020. Water from the plant will be required to come online by June 2021.

MEED reported in November 2017 that EWA had appointed the Netherlands’ KPMG Fakhro as financial adviser for the Al-Dur 2 scheme. The UK-based Trowers & Hamlins is legal adviser for the project, with Canada’s WSP appointed as technical adviser. KPMG was the low bidder out of the three that opened on 10 November, with a price of BD616,375 ($1.6m).

Peak demand growth for electricity in Bahrain reached 8.1 per cent in 2014 and was recorded at 3.5 per cent in 2015. EWA predicts consumption will continue to increase by an annual average of up to 6.4 per cent until 2020.