The local Al-Toukhi Company for Industry & Trading has been awarded a SR416.2m ($111m) contract to build a substation at Madain, Saudi Arabia.

The local contractor was awarded the deal by the Saudi Electricity Company (SEC). The project will involve building a 380kV substation for the Maidan area. The work will include providing and assembling power transformers, low voltage AC and DC equipment, associated facilities and related civil works.

The project is part of SEC’s programme to expand the kingdom’s electricity capacity to cope with its rapidly growing population. SEC recently told attendants at MEED’s Saudi Mega Infrastructure Projects conference that a new structure to create a competitive market for electricity generation in Saudi Arabia should be in place in 2014.

At present, SEC generates, transfers and distributes electricity on a national basis. The restructuring will involve dividing SEC’s electricity generation business into similar companies that will compete with each other and SEC independent power projects (IPPs). SEC will also set up a single buyer of electricity from the four electricity generation companies and the IPPs. A single separate transmission company has already been established and has been in operation since January 2012.