The state's first commercial heavy sour crude oil production project is aimed initially at processing 50,000 barrels a day (b/d) of crude from 20 wells in the two northern oil fields of Rawdhatain and Sabriya. The scheme will also produce about 35 million cubic feet a day of gas, which KOC plans to supply to state refinery operator Kuwait National Petroleum Company (KNPC). The scheme's engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) element will be carried out by the US' Interstate Treating. The facility will include a produced water treatment and effluent water disposal system and gas compression units, an amine treating and sweetening plant and sulphur recovery and tail gas units.

The EPF project is part of KOC's plans to process sour crude and blend it with the sweet crude produced from its oil fields in the north, south and southeast. KOC's production capacity is more than 2.6 million b/d; it plans to increase capacity to 4 million b/d by 2020 (MEED 3:6:05).