Tenders have been released for the front-end engineering and design (feed) contract on the $7.4bn Al-Sejeel petrochemicals complex planned for Ras Laffan in Qatar.

The move comes two months after MEED reported that the project’s owners, Qatar Petroleum (QP) and Qatar Petrochemical Company (Qapco), had awarded the US’ Bechtel the project management consultancy (PMC) deal.

“The feed has been released now and will be split into the cracker and the rest of the technical units,” says a petrochemicals source based in the GCC. “The scheme is drawing a lot of interest.”

The engineering consultancies interested in bidding on the technical units of the project include:

• Fluor (US)
• Foster Wheeler (US)
• Jacobs Engineering (US)
• WorleyParsons (Australia)  

The firms expected to bid on the mixed-feed cracker all own the requisite technology and are set to include:

• CB&I Lummus (US)
• KBR (US)
• Linde (Germany)
• Technip (France)

The preliminary technology bid submission is expected on 16 December, along with the unpriced commercial submission. The final technical submission is expected on 17 February, with the full commercial submission on 16 April.

The engineering procurement and construction (EPC) tenders are expected to be released in early 2015.

The Al-Sejeel project is a world-scale complex that will produce more than 3 million tonnes a year (t/y) of chemicals when completed.

The scheme will produce 1.4 million t/y of ethylene when completed, which will feed other units at the proposed complex. A further 850,000 t/y of high-density polyethylene (HDPE), 430,000 t/y of linear low-density polyethylene (LDPE), 760,000 t/y of polypropylene and 83,000 t/y of butadiene will be produced.

The partners signed technology licences in June with two US firms: Univation Technologies for the polyethylene units and Dow Chemical for the polypropylene units. The construction tender and execution phases will follow in 2014-15. Completion is expected in 2018.

The cracker forms part of an ambitious strategy by Doha to increase petrochemicals output from the current 9 million t/y to 23 million t/y by 2020. QP is also planning the Al-Karaana petrochemicals complex, a joint venture with the UK/Dutch Shell Group.