The US’ Fluor has stated that it intends to become part of Saudi Aramco’s general engineering services plus (GES plus) scheme in the near future.

Speaking at the MEED Saudi Arabian EPC Projects 2011 conference currently being held in Al-Khobar in the Eastern Province Ian Murray, director of business development for Fluor said that the company would welcome involvement in the scheme.  

 “This is something we want to become involved in and are looking to become part of [the GES plus] in the near future,” said Murray.

Fluor was not one of the original seven bidders who first submitted proposals, but Murray said expected Fluor would become involved soon, but refrained to give an exact timeframe.

The GES plus was designed to enable local engineers to gain vital experience on complex big budget process engineering facilities such as oil refineries and petrochemical plants (MEED 26:11:11).

To meet the criteria set by Saudi Aramco, a partnership must be formed with a local engineering consultancy. If selected, the joint venture partner then performs front-end engineering and design (feed) and select detailed engineering work, as well as project management services for the oil giant.

There are currently five signatories of the GES plus. Canada’s SNC Lavalin was the latest and joined an all-American list that includes KBR, Mustang Engineering, Foster Wheeler and Jacobs Engineering.

Two companies are now left from the seven original bidders to sign GES plus deals. They are France’s Technip and Australia’s WorleyParsons.

Speaking at the conference Arturo Grimaldi, Technip’s senior vice-president in the Middle East also said that he hoped the company would sign a GES plus contract with Aramco soon.

“[Technip] are still part of this competition and it is not over for us,” Grimaldi said. “We are hoping to be awarded the project, but nothing has been finalised. “