State-owned upstream operator Kuwait Oil Company (KOC) has tendered a contract for Operation and Maintenance Services for North Kuwait Heavy Oil Facilities.

The deadline for bid submission is 12 September 2021 and an online pre-tender meeting is due to be held on 14 July.

The main package for phase 1 of Kuwait Oil Company’s (KOC) Ratqa Lower Fars heavy oil megaproject was completed in August 2019.

A consortium of UK-based Petrofac and Lebanon’s Consolidated Contractors Company (CCC) won the $4.1bn contract for the package in January 2015.

The scope of work covered greenfield and brownfield facilities.

It included engineering, procurement, construction, pre-commissioning, commissioning, start-up, and operations and maintenance work for the main central processing facility (CPF) and associated infrastructure, as well as a production support complex.

The broader project also includes a pipeline package worth $842m. This was won by Italy’s Saipem in July 2017.

The pipeline will extend for almost 162 kilometres. It will transport the heavy crude from the CPF to the south tank farm located in Ahmadi.

Once the oil is at the south tank farm, KOC will have the option to send it to the Al-Zour refinery in the south of Kuwait.

Front-end engineering design (feed) work is underway for Phase 2 and Phase 3 is in the study phase.

Phases 2 and 3 are estimated to be worth $2bn each.