Ras Al Zour IWPP

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Vikas Kumar of Contax looks at the status of a major IWPP project in Saudi Arabia.

GCC Context

The planned GCC energy Capex landscape for 2008 to 2010 continues to show signs of growth over the period 2005 - 2007, with US $368 billion worth of investments already on the table.

The power sector continues to be the dominant sector with US $80 billion planned for award by the end of 2010.

Saudi Arabia and the UAE continue to maintain their leading positions in power projects, with circa 46% and 28% respectively worth of the investment already planned within the GCC
power space.

However, following Contax's analysis of project postponements from 2007 to 2008 and to date within 2008, it is likely that the market will continue to see a considerable amount of award and execution schedule slippages.

Nevertheless, given the GCC's domestic requirements for power and water, in particular within Saudi Arabia and the UAE, it is anticipated that a number of key projects will be realised to help bridge the global demand and supply gap.

A major project that is expected to help Saudi Arabia achieve this goal is the Ras Al Zour IWPP.

Strategic importance

Eighty kilometres to the north of Jubail, on the east coast of Saudi Arabia, the Kingdom's Water and Electricity Company (WEC) is slowly moving forward with plans to construct the Ras Al Zour Independent Water and Power Project (IWPP).

The Ras Al Zour IWPP is one of several power and water projects that Saudi Arabia has planned to construct under a multi-billion-dollar budget, set to be invested over the next decade.

The ambitious programme is expected to add an additional 15,000MW to the Kingdom's national grid and help meet the demand arising from both a growing population as well as the rising energy needs of its fast developing industrial sector.

To achieve this, the Kingdom had planned three core venture IWPP's at Shuaiba, Jubail and Ras Al Zour, all of which are to be developed on a build, own and operate principle.

However, protracted negotiations between the interested international players and the Saudi Ministerial Committee is said to have delayed their implementation.

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