Saudi Arabia appoints Finnish firm for desalination project

03 September 2017

Company will provide owner’s engineer services for plant 

Saline Water Conversion Company (SWCC) has awarded Finland’s Poyry a contract for owner’s engineer services on the planned Shuaiba 4 desalination plant, which will be located about 50 miles south of Jeddah.

The facility will have a capacity of about 400,000 cubic metres a day (cm/d), and will utilise reverse osmosis (RO) technology.

MEED reported in April that South Korea’s Doosan Heavy Industries & Construction had been awarded a $422m engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract to build the desalination plant.

Doosan saw off competition from the consortium of the local Hydrochem and Saudi Services for Electromechanical Works (SSEM) to win the EPC contract.

The project faced several delays in the tendering phase due to debates about the procurement model and the site location. The scheme had originally been tendered in 2015.

Also in April, Saudi Arabia’s Acwa Power awarded an estimated $255m deal to a joint venture of Italy’s Salini Impregilo and Spain’s Abengoa for the expansion of the Shuaiba 3 independent water and power project (IWPP).

The project will involve building a reverse osmosis (RO) desalination facility, which will have a capacity of about 250,000 cm/d. US/Indian Synergy Consulting is the financial and lead adviser to SWCC for the scheme.

The joint venture is aiming to hand over the plant by May 2019.

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