Germany’s Siemens has been awarded a $590m contract to supply turbines and other associated equipment for the Rabigh 2 independent power project (IPP) in Saudi Arabia.

Siemens will supply six gas turbines, three steam turbines and nine generators for the combined-cycle Rabigh 2 IPP. The German firm was awarded the contract by South Korea’s Samsung C&T, which is building the plant for the Al-Mourjan for Electricity Production Company.

The Al-Mourjan Electricity Production Company was set up by the local Acwa Power consortium, which was awarded the contract by the Saudi Electricity Company (SEC) to develop the $1.6bn Rabigh 2 independent power project (IPP). The Acwa consortium signed the power purchase agreement (PPA) with SEC on 30 November 2013.

The Rabigh 2 plant will have a power generation capacity of 2,060MW and will be located in Rabigh on the western coast of Saudi Arabia, 150 kilometres north of Jeddah.

The Rabigh 2 IPP will form part of the kingdom’s efforts to boost generating capacity in the coming years to cope with the expected rise in demand. In its 2012 annual report, SEC forecasts that peak demand will grow from the 51,900MW recorded in 2012 to 85,000MW in 2020 and 120,000MW by 2030.