Kuwait selects advisers for Al-Zour independent water and power project

17 March 2010

Group to provide financial, legal and technical advisory services

Kuwait’s Partnerships Technical Bureau (PTB) has selected French bank BNP Paribas with US law firm Chadbourne & Parke and Germany’s Lahmeyer International to advise on the country’s first independent water and power project (IWPP).

The selection will be considered final once it has been approved by an audit committee.

Kuwait tendered the advisory mandate on the development of an IWPP at Al-Zour in mid-2009, and by the 20 August bid deadline at least 10 groups had submitted proposals.

This was narrowed to a list of four bidding groups before two consortiums were informed that their bids were no longer being considered.

The rejected bids were submitted by UK-based financial adviser Ernst & Young, US law firm DLA Piper and the UK’s Mott MacDonald; and the US’ Citigroup with UK lawyers Clifford Chance and the Shaw Group, also of the US.

The two remaining bidding groups in competition were the BNP Paribas-led consortium and the UK’s HSBC with UK law firm Norton Rose and Germany’s Fichtner (MEED 13:1:10).

The planned IWPP will consist of a power plant with capacity of 1,500MW and a desalination plant capable of producing 100 million gallons a day of desalinated water.

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