Six Kuwaiti oil and gas packages worth $11.6bn have seen extensions to their bid deadlines, prompting concern that projects due to be awarded this year may see significant delays.

All six packages were due to see deadlines in February, but now require contractors to submit prices in either March or April.

Contractors are now required to submit bids for the New Refinery Project packages one, two and three by 10 March.

The packages are worth a combined total of $9.6bn. Packages four and five are currently under evaluation.

State-owned upstream operator Kuwait Oil Company has postponed the bid deadline for the $300m engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract for the manifold that will transport liquids from oil wells to gathering centres 29, 30 and 21 in northern Kuwait.

Bids are now due in on 5 April. The UK’s Petrofac and South Korea’s Daelim are prospective bidders on the scheme.

The bid deadline for the Mina al-Ahmadi refinery’s fifth gas fractionation train is now 3 March, after it was extended twice in December and once in February.

The $1.5bn Kuwait National Petroleum Company (KNPC) project will increase Kuwait’s gas production capacity to 805 million cubic feet a day (cf/d) as well as boost capacity for condensate.

Kuwait’s $260m water treatment and injection plant, which was tendered in October, is now due to see bids submitted by 19 April. Previously the bid deadline was 8 February.

The treatment plant, which is slated to be located in northern Kuwait, will consist of an effluent water treatment plant and an injection facility to be used in the enhanced recovery of hydrocarbons.

The firm that wins the contract will be responsible for the EPC work including site preparation and civil works, shelters and buildings, tanks, filters, structural work, equipment, pumps and drivers, pipelines, electrical work, instrumentation and coating systems.