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Lowest bidders emerge for Dorra offshore gas packages

31 March 2026

 

Italian, Indian and Spanish contractors have emerged as the lowest bidders for three engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) packages that form part of Al-Khafji Joint Operations’ (KJO) project to develop natural gas from the Dorra gas field, located in the waters of the Saudi-Kuwait Neutral Zone.

A consortium of Italian contractor Saipem and India’s Larsen & Toubro Energy Hydrocarbon (L&TEH) is understood to have submitted the lowest bid for offshore packages 2A and 2B, according to sources. The only other consortium said to have submitted bids for packages 2A and 2B comprises Abu Dhabi-based NMDC Energy and South Korea’s Hyundai Heavy Industries.

The EPC scope of work for package 2A includes Dorra gas field wellhead topsides, flowlines and umbilicals. Package 2B involves the central gathering platform complex, export pipelines and cables.

Spanish contractor Tecnicas Reunidas is understood to have emerged as the lowest bidder for onshore package 3, sources told MEED. Package 3 covers the EPC of onshore gas processing facilities.

KJO, which is jointly owned by Saudi Aramco subsidiary Aramco Gulf Operations Company and Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (KPC) subsidiary Kuwait Gulf Oil Company (KGOC), has divided the project’s scope of work into four EPC packages – three offshore and one onshore.

L&TEH is the contractor for package 1 of the Dorra facilities project, which covers the EPC of seven offshore jackets and the laying of intra-field pipelines. The contract awarded by KJO to L&TEH is estimated to be valued at $140m-$150m, MEED reported in October.

Saudi Arabia and Kuwait have been pressing ahead with their plan to jointly produce 1 billion cubic feet a day (cf/d) of gas from the Dorra gas field.

The two countries have been producing oil from the Neutral Zone – primarily from the onshore Wafra field and offshore Khafji field – since at least the 1950s. With a growing need to increase natural gas production, they have been working to exploit the Dorra offshore field, understood to be the only gas field in the Neutral Zone.

Discovered in 1965, the Dorra gas field is estimated to hold 20 trillion cubic metres of gas and 310 million barrels of oil.

The Dorra facilities scheme is one of three multibillion-dollar projects launched by subsidiaries of Saudi Aramco and KPC to produce and process gas from the Dorra field that has advanced in the past few months.

AGOC onshore Khafji gas plant

AGOC has set a current bid submission deadline of 22 April for seven EPC packages as part of a project to construct the Khafji gas plant, which will process gas from the Dorra field onshore Saudi Arabia.

MEED previously reported that AGOC issued main tenders for the seven EPC packages in 2025. Contractors were initially set deadlines of 24 October for technical bid submissions and 9 November for the submission of commercial bids, which was then extended by AGOC until 22 December.

The seven EPC packages cover a range of works, including open-art and licensed process facilities, pipelines, industrial support infrastructure, site preparation, overhead transmission lines, power supply systems and main operational and administrative buildings.

France-based Technip Energies has carried out a concept study and front-end engineering and design (feed) work on the entire Dorra gas field development programme.

Progress has been hampered by a geopolitical dispute over ownership of the Dorra gas field. Iran, which refers to the field as Arash, claims it partially extends into Iranian territory and asserts that Tehran should be a stakeholder in its development. Kuwait and Saudi Arabia maintain that the field lies entirely within their jointly administered Neutral Zone – also known as the Divided Zone – and that Iran has no legal basis for its claim.

In February 2024, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia reiterated their claim to the Dorra field in a joint statement issued during an official meeting in Riyadh between the Kuwaiti Emir, Sheikh Mishal Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, and the Saudi Crown Prince and Prime Minister, Mohammed Bin Salman Bin Abdulaziz Al-Saud.

Since that show of strength and unity, projects to produce and process gas from the Dorra field have gained momentum.

KGOC onshore processing facilities

KGOC has initiated early engagement with contractors for the main EPC tendering process for a planned Dorra onshore gas processing facility, which is to be located in Kuwait.

KGOC is at the feed stage of the project, which is estimated to be valued at up to $3.3bn. The firm is now expected to issue the main EPC tender within the first quarter of this year, MEED recently reported.

The proposed facility will receive gas from a pipeline from the Dorra offshore field, which is being separately developed by KJO. The complex will have the capacity to process up to 632 million cf/d of gas and 88.9 million barrels a day of condensates from the Dorra field.

The facility will be located near the Al-Zour refinery, owned by another KPC subsidiary, Kuwait Integrated Petroleum Industries Company.

A 700,000-square-metre plot has been allocated next to the Al-Zour refinery for the gas processing facility and discussions regarding survey work are ongoing. The site could require shoring, backfilling and dewatering.

The onshore gas processing plant will also supply surplus gas to KPC’s upstream business, Kuwait Oil Company, for possible injection into its oil fields.

Additionally, KGOC plans to award licensed technology contracts to US-based Honeywell UOP and Shell subsidiary Shell Catalysts & Technologies for the plant’s acid gas removal unit and sulphur recovery unit, respectively.

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Indrajit Sen

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