Saudi Electricity Company (SEC) has extended the deadline for the contract to expand the 2,640MW Jeddah South power plant, which is currently under commissioning in the Western Province of the kingdom.

The project will involve the installation of two new units, which will increase the capacity of the oil-fired plant by about 1,300MW. Contractors had initially been invited to submit proposals for the engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract by the end of September, but the client has extended the bid process without setting a new deadline.

“The client has extended the deadline without setting a new submission date,” says a source close to the scheme. “It is possible the [procurement] model may be changed and it could come back to the market as an IPP [independent power project] in 2017, but so far it remains an EPC project.”

SEC has prequalified contractors in three categories, with 10 of the 15 prequalified in the A category. Firms prequalified in the A category are free to bid without conditions.

The prequalifiers in the A category are:

• Bechtel (US)
• Black & Veatch (US)
• Doosan (South Korea)
• GE (US)
• Hyundai Heavy Industries (HHI; South Korea)
• Hyundai Engineering & Construction (South Korea)
• Mitsubishi Corporation (Japan)
• Shaw (US)
• Siemens (Germany)
• SNC Lavalin (Canada)

Three contractors have been prequalified in the B category:

• Daelim (South Korea)
• Daewoo (South Korea)
• Samsung C&T (South Korea)

Contractors prequalified in the B category have been invited to bid on the condition that they bid in partnership with an independent engineer.

Spain’s Tecnicas Reunidas and the local National Contracting Company have been prequalified in category C. The two contractors are only eligibile to bid as part of consortiums with contractors in categories A or B.

MEED recently reported that the first 660MW of power from the Jeddah South plant had been commissioned and was connected to the national grid.

HHI was awarded a $3.2bn deal to build the Jeddah South plant in October 2012. Japan’s Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) is supplying the equipment.

The plant will comprise four conventional thermal generating units, each with a minimum capacity of 600MW. The contractor will also be responsible for constructing a 380kV substation to serve the scheme.

SEC is expected to tender most of its future major power generation projects under the IPP model as Riyadh seeks to cut capital expenditure as a result in the fall of oil prices.

MEED recently reported that SEC had invited developers to submit expressions of interest (EoIs) for the planned 5,400MW PP15 power project, which will be developed as an IPP.