Russia’s Lukoil has invited companies to bid to supply front-end engineering and design (feed) services for the Tuba-Fao oil export pipelines project in southern Iraq.

The project aims to build a 120-kilometre pipeline linking the Tuba oil depot to the Al-Fao terminal in Basra province, southern Iraq, for export.

Lukoil president Vagit Alekperov told journalists in Moscow in 2014 that the Tuba-Fao pipeline would cost an estimated $850m.

The Tuba tank farm was part of Lukoil’s phase-one development of the West Qurna-2 oil field in southern Iraq. The storage depot was built with an initial capacity of 198,000 cubic metres.

Lukoil has a number of engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contracts in the tender stage for the second-phase expansion of West Qurna-2.

Contracts are still to be announced on the central processing facilities (CPF) expansion, the water injection and oil gathering system, river water intake and water treatment plant, a power plant and pipelines for water, gas and liquefied petroleum gas (LPG).

Alekperov had a meeting with Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi in late March focusing on the future of field development at West Qurna-2.

“Our company sticks to its plans to develop the business in Iraq on a long-term basis and to increase the production of oil,” Alekperov said following the meeting in Baghdad.

The first phase of the project, named Early Oil, was commissioned in 2014 and will boost capacity to a planned 400,000 b/d. Lukoil reported in late July 2014 that it was producing 280,000 b/d.

The second phase, also known as the Mishrif full field development, will increase production by 150,000 b/d to 550,000 b/d. Lukoil has hired Australia’s WorleyParsons as the project management consultant (PMC) for the expansion.

In January 2014, Lukoil signed an amended agreement with the Oil Ministry to reduce its plateau oil production target to 1.2 million b/d, from the original 1.8 million b/d signed in 2010.

West Qurna-2 is operated by state-owned South Oil Company and a consortium of contractors including Lukoil (75 per cent of consortium) and state-run North Oil Company (25 per cent).