Contractor prequalification has opened for the proposed Oman Tank Terminal Company (OTTCO) project at Ras Markaz on Oman’s Wusta coast.
OTTCO, a joint venture between Oman Oil Company (90 percent) and its downstream investment arm, Takamul Investment Company (10 percent), is inviting international contractors to work on the project.
Ras Markaz Crude Oil Park will cover an area of 1,600ha, and will be located 70km south of the Duqm Special Economic Zone (SEZ), one of a series of new ports and industrial zones initiated the Sultanate government. Capacity will be 200 million barrels of crude with the target for the project’s first phase of 25 million barrels. The first phase is due to come on-stream by the end of 2018.
The prequalification marks the start of a competitive process leading to the award of a contract for the detailed engineering design, procurement, construction, pre-commissioning and commissioning on a lump sum turnkey basis.
Known officially as ‘Ras Markaz Crude Oil Park’, the facility will be on a greenfield site.
Front-end engineering design (FEED) work is being undertaken by Amec Foster Wheeler. Both onshore and offshore elements of the project are being incorporated into the FEED, although the successful EPC contractor will have to come up with a detailed engineering design before undertaking the construction of the first phase.
Separately, state-owned gas transport utility Oman Gas Company (OGC) has undertaken a pre-feasibility study of an oil pipeline that will tap into the country’s Main Oil Line at Nahada in central Oman, and transport crude over a 440km distance to Ras Markaz.
A separate pipeline will connect the Ras Markaz terminal with a new $6 billion refinery in the early stages of execution at Duqm SEZ. The 230,000 bpd facility is being developed by Duqm Refinery and Petrochemical Industries, a 50-50 joint venture between Oman Oil Company and IPIC of Abu Dhabi.
Qualified international firms have until 29 June 2015 to register interest in bidding for the construction package.
