Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC; www.adnoc.ae) awarded a Pre-Front End Engineering and Designing (Pre-FEED) contract to the Wood Group (Aberdeen, Scotland; www.woodplc.com), a global leader in engineering, project and technical services, for the new refinery in Ruwais, which is said to be the world’s largest integrated refining and petrochemicals complex.
The contract award is a key milestone as ADNOC accelerates delivery of its AED 165 billion ($45 billion) expansionary downstream strategy.
The award is for a state-of-the-art refinery with a capacity of 600,000 barrels of crude oil per day. In keeping with modern design, the new refinery will be designed to have full conversion capability and allow integration with petrochemicals industries in Ruwais which is already the fourth largest single site refinery in the world.
ADNOC Refining CEO, Jasem Ali Al Sayegh said: “Today marks a significant step towards fulfilling ADNOC’s strategy of developing the largest integrated refinery and petrochemicals complex in the world. We are delighted to partner with Wood and to have their global expertise available to us. This is a major milestone in the future growth plans of ADNOC Refining.”
The award of the Pre-FEED contract is the second stage in a four-stage process to get to the beginning of construction. The previous stage was a feasibility study. The Pre-FEED is expected to be completed by the end of this year.
This announcement follows last month’s signing of two strategic equity partnerships between ADNOC and Eni and OMV, covering both ADNOC Refining and a new trading joint venture, which will be jointly established by the three partners. Eni and OMV will acquire 20% and 15% shares in ADNOC Refining respectively, with ADNOC owning the remaining 65%. Eni and OMV will also own 20% and 15% of the shares respectively of the trading joint venture. According to ADNOC, the transactions reflect the scale, quality and growth potential of ADNOC Refining’s assets, coupled with an advantageous location from which to supply markets in Africa, Asia and Europe.
In May 2018, ADNOC announced plans to invest, alongside partners, in creating the world’s largest and most advanced integrated refining and petrochemicals complex at Ruwais. A cornerstone of the plan is expansion of refining capacity by more than 65 per cent by 2025, creating a total capacity of 1.5 million barrels per day (mbpd).
The new refinery, coupled with other projects underway within the Ruwais complex, will significantly increase the capability, flexibility and output of ADNOC Refining’s operations by adding to the range of crudes that can be processed.