South Korea's Samsung Engineering has been awarded an engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract for a $700m petrochemicals plant in Saudi Arabia.

The ethylene oxide/ethylene glycol (EO/EG) plant is being developed by Jubail United Petrochemical Company (JUPC), which is an affiliate of Saudi Basic Industries Corporation.

The plant's production capacity is estimated to be 700,000 metric tonnes of ethylene glycol per year. Samsung Engineering says the construction of the project, which is also the third phase of the Jubail Ethylene Glycol Plant, will be executed by 2020.

The facility will be located in Jubail Industrial City located 100 kilometres north of Dammam, in the kingdom’s Eastern Province.

According to regional projects tracker MEED Projects, Samsung Engineering emerged successful to win the EPC contract from a pool of prequalified bidders that included fellow South Korean contractor eTec E&C, Sinopec and Wison Engineering from China and Taiwan’s CTCI Corporation.

Samsung Engineering also has a track record of delivering 27 projects in Saudi Arabia, 22 of those for Sabic affiliates including JUPC. Samsung Engineering has been among the pre-qualified bidders for JUPC’s initial Jubail Ethylence Glycol Plant and phase 2 of Petro Rabigh’s caprolactam and nylon-6 plant, according to MEED Projects.

Samsung Engineering is one of the top EG plant builders globally, having delivered 16 plants in total till date. During the last 10 years, the South Korean contractor has built EG plants in the US, Malaysia, Thailand and India.