Kuwait Oil Company opens door for development of new projects

KUWAIT CITY - The Kuwait Oil Company (KOC) has opened the door for the development and execution of a number of future projects for registered international specialized contractors according to the specific categories of civil and construction works, which is considered a long-awaited step to qualifying new companies, reports Al-Anba daily quoting official oil sources.

According to the approved list of projects which are worth between 1 billion and 2 billion dollars, 11 international companies have been qualified including the South Korea’s Dilem, Fluor, Hyundai Heavy Industries, JGC of Japan, Petrofac, Saipem, Samsung, SKK, Technip, Tecnicas of Reunidas of Spain and Kellogg Brown & Root. The contractors who have been qualified within this category have practical experience of up to 15 years and have the ability, equipment, machinery, tools and experienced personnel to implement services and projects and drilling wells.

The sources pointed out that the rehabilitation process comes in light of the efforts of the oil sector to spend about 34 billion dinars over the next five years, including about 70 percent for the expansion of exploration and production activity inside and outside Kuwait.

The sources also pointed out 15 international companies have been qualified among the big companies which are eligible for the work of between 600 million and one billion. In addition to the above 11 companies are Daewoo Engineering and Construction South Korea, Larsen & Tubro of India, Sinopec Chinese and SNC Canada.

The international companies eligible for the implementation of oil projects worth between $350 million and $600 million which has been qualified are National Petroleum Construction Company of the United Arab Emirates in addition to the above 15 companies. Sources stressed that the process of qualification is conducted according to certain conditions which reviewed through specialized committees to ensure the integrity of the evaluation and ensure neutrality that these companies have all the qualifications since some works require international certification.

Some of them require certificates from the American Society of Engineers and “we have to check them all.” In the case of rejection of any company, it means that it has a problem somewhere but the door remains open for clarifications in the event of objection of the results of the evaluation. He pointed out the KOC receives about 20 new qualification requests every month and noted «the time of rehabilitation depends on the extent of meeting the requirements.”

He pointed out that Kuwait is constantly seeking to increase the production of crude oil to 4.75 million barrels per day by 2040 and Kuwait Oil Company will achieve its goal in this regard as all projects that support the achievement of those levels are in the implementation phase and will be operated according to plans.

This is besides targeting the development of non-associated natural gas production in Kuwait to reach 2.5 billion cubic feet per day in 2040. “We will achieve production of 1 billion cubic feet per day by 2023,” he said.