A joint venture of Saudi Electricity Company (SEC) and state oil major Saudi Aramco has signed the main contracts with a consortium led by UK/France’s Engie to develop the Fadhili independent power project (IPP).

MEED reported in March that Engie was the only bidder still in discussions with the client and the frontrunner to win the contract. According to sources close to the scheme, the contract was awarded on 18 July and officially signed at a ceremony on 20 July.

The project has slipped behind schedule, with the client having initially set a target of appointing a successful bidder in December 2015 and signing electricity and steam offtake agreements in mid-January 2016.

The EPC contractor in the Engie consortium is South Korea’s Doosan.

The cogeneration project is scheduled to be developed on a 20-year power, water and steam purchase agreement (PWSPA), with Aramco the offtaker for the steam and water components and SEC the offtaker for the produced electricity.

The proposed IPP will have:

• Total power capacity of 1,500MW-1,600MW
• Total steam capacity of 3,190,000 pounds an hour
• Water production capacity of 768.8 tonnes an hour

The project owner will create a project company to develop the IPP, with the client holding 50-60 per cent of equity ownership and the successful developer holding the remainder.