The Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc) is set to launch an engineering design contest for upstream projects at two of its key offshore gas fields.

MEED reported in April that Adnoc was planning to launch a competition to find the most competitive and cost-effective front-end engineering and design (feed) for an upstream project in Abu Dhabi.

Engineering contractors will be asked to participate in the ‘feed competition’ to be organised on a pilot basis this year for the projects, an Adnoc executive had told MEED. According to a source, the projects for which Adnoc Offshore is looking to organise the contest are on the Umm Shaif and Belbazem gas fields.

The source said Adnoc has started pre-qualifying engineering firms for the exercise, which is set to begin imminently.

Adnoc is looking to increase gas production from its assets as part of its Vision 2030 goal, and is therefore launching the projects to ramp up gas outputs from the two fields.

The Umm Shaif field is expected to hold 30.7 trillion cubic feet (cf/d) of gas reserves in place.

In March, Adnoc awarded France’s Total, Italy’s Eni and China’s CNPC 20 per cent, 10 per cent and 10 per cent stakes respectively in the Umm Shaif and Nasr offshore oil concession.

The Belbazem field, operated by the former Al Yasat Petroleum which is now integrated with Adnoc Offshore, produces 27 million cf/d of gas a day.