State-owned Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc) has given Spain’s Tecnicas Reunidas a letter of award for the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) of new facilities to maintain production at the onshore Bu Hasa oil field, sources close to the project said.

Tecnicas Reunidas beat rival proposals from four other bidding groups, submitting commercial bids on 12 August. The bidders were:

• Larsen & Toubro (L&T - India)
• China Petroleum Pipeline Engineering Corporation (CPPEC - China)
• Saipem (Italy) / ENPPI (Egypt)
• Petrofac (UK)
• Tecnicas Reunidas (Spain)

Following the first round of commercial proposals, Adnoc Onshore, the operator of the field, asked the bidders to submit revised bids by 17 September. Both CPPEC and L&T had previously been considered frontrunners for the estimated $1.5bn project in a tightly fought competition.

However, sources said the Spanish contractor’s In-Country Value (ICV) proposal was key to winning the contract, with Adnoc’s business partners having to undergo a fresh ICV certification process under the improved localisation regime.

Spokesmen for Adnoc and Tecnicas Reunidas could not be reached for a comment.

The value of the contract has not yet been confirmed.

A date for a formal contract signing is still to be set, but is expected to take place at the Abu Dhabi International Petroleum Exhibition and Conference from 12-15 November.

Tecnicas Reunidas will build new facilities to sustain and increase the Bu Hasa field’s production at 650,000 barrels a day (b/d) in the long-term. The scope includes the expansion of gathering facilities, two new compression trains, a new water injection network and upgrades to the oil-gas separation trains.

Adnoc completed the awards in February 2017 for its most prized onshore concession after more than three years of talks, handing out 40 per cent in equity stakes for the Abu Dhabi Company for Onshore Oil Operations, now known as Adnoc Onshore.

The stakeholders include the UK’s BP, France’s Total, Japan's Inpex, South Korea's GS Energy, along with CNPC and CEFC of China. The concession covers Abu Dhabi's biggest onshore fields, which are the source of its Murban export crude.

Currently pumping about 1.6 million b/d, Adnoc Onshore is targeting 1.8 million b/d of crude production capacity this year as its contribution to the long-held UAE/Abu Dhabi government target of raising the UAE's total production capacity to 3.5 million b/d.

In September, the liquefied natural gas (LNG) arm of Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc LNG) awarded the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract for phase 2 of the energy major’s Integrated Gas Development (IGD 2) to a joint venture of Tecnicas Reunidas and Abu Dhabi-based Target Engineering.