Maaden releases first package for phosphate city

22 January 2013

Maaden’s ammonia package is first to be released at Waad al-Shamal in the north of the kingdom  

Saudi Arabian Mining Company (Maaden) has released the tenders for its first engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) package at its proposed $6bn phosphates mining city at Waad al-Shamal in the north of the kingdom.

The first EPC package is for an ammonia plant to be built at the city and Maaden has invited four South Korean contractors to bid for the scheme. The bid deadline for the tender is late February.

The contractors are:

  • Daelim Industrial
  • GS Engineering & Construction
  • Hyundai Engineering & Construction
  • Samsung Engineering

“This is the first packages and will be shortly followed by two more,” says a source familiar with the scheme. “I am not sure why there are only four EPC contractors bidding for the package, but they are all South Koreans so it should still be competitive.”

The next two EPC packages to be released are expected to be for the monopotassium phosphate (MPK) and tris-acetate phosphate (TAP) units.

The US’s Jacobs Engineering is carrying out the front-end engineering and design (feed) and the US’ Fluor is carrying out the project management consultancy for the technical packages, worth a total of about $4bn, at the city.

The city is being built so Maaden can fully utilise the phosphates from its Al-Khabra mine.

The scope of works for the city will include a mining component, as well as eight different processing plants and a utilities and offsites package. The phosphate produced at Al-Khabra is low in heavy metal content and thus ideal to be used for food production, as well as fertiliser and animal feed. The measured reserves of the Al-Khabra deposit are estimated to be 236 million tonnes.

Riyadh also plans to use the city as a catalyst for the economic development of the area. Waad al-Shami will become the major phosphates hub in the kingdom and a major downstream phosphates cluster for attracting international companies is also planned for the area.

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