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OQ seeks revised prices for NGL project from preferred contractors

26 August 2026

 

Omani state energy conglomerate OQ Group has sought revised commercial proposals from a set of preferred bidders for its planned project to build a major natural gas liquids (NGL) facility in the sultanate.

The planned NGL facility at Saih Nihayda in central Oman will extract condensates and transport them to Duqm on the sultanate’s Arabian Sea coast for fractionation and export, OQ Group said.

OQ Group intends to deliver the project using a front-end engineering and design (feed)-to-engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) competition model. Under this model, the project operator selects contractors to carry out the feed work. The operator then awards the EPC contract to the contractor with the most competitive feed proposal, while compensating the other participants for their work.

MEED reported in June that OQ Group was seeking revised prices from contractors it had selected earlier this year to participate in the feed-to-EPC competition. Contractors submitted their revised bids by 6 July.

According to sources, OQ Group entered into negotiations with bidders in the weeks after receiving the revised commercial bids. The client is then said to have approached only the following three contractors for their final commercial offers on the NGL project:

  • Saipem (Italy)
  • Tecnicas Reunidas (Spain)
  • Tecnimont (Italy)

MEED previously reported that the contractors who had submitted their original proposals to OQ for the feed-to-EPC competition on 20 May were:

  • Hyundai Engineering & Construction (South Korea) / KBR (US)
  • JGC Corporation (Japan)
  • Petrofac (UK)
  • Saipem (Italy)
  • Technip Energies (France)
  • Tecnicas Reunidas (Spain)
  • Tecnimont (Italy)

OQ issued the main tender for the feed-to-EPC competition in March, setting an initial deadline of 8 April for contractors to submit proposals, which it later extended to 6 May and then again to 20 May.

MEED previously reported that the state enterprise had started the prequalification process for the feed-to-EPC contest for the planned NGL project in November last year, with contractors submitting responses by 15 December.

In addition to the contractors understood to have submitted proposals for the feed-to-EPC competition, OQ also invited the following firms to participate, although they are understood to have pulled out of the contest later:

  • Chiyoda (Japan) / CTCI (Taiwan)
  • GS Engineering & Construction (South Korea)
  • Kent (UAE)
  • Samsung E&A (South Korea) / Larsen & Toubro Energy Hydrocarbon (India) / Wood (UAE).
Project scope of work

The scope of work on the project covers the development, verification and integration of feed deliverables for the following facilities and systems:

NGL extraction facility – Saih Nihayda:

  • Verification and updating of the existing feed to enable dual-mode operation (ethane recovery and ethane rejection)
  • Identification and implementation of required process, equipment, utilities and control system modifications
     

NGL pipeline – Saih Nihayda to Duqm:

  • Feed for a new NGL transmission pipeline stretching approximately 230 kilometres, including routing, hydraulics, stations, pigging facilities, metering, corrosion protection, leak detection and safety systems
     

Fractionation unit at Duqm:

  • Feed for a new fractionation facility to process ethane and propane plus NGL and recover propane, butane, condensate, and the provision for future ethane recovery
  • Design accommodating licensed or open-art technology and future tie-in to a planned petrochemicals project in Duqm
     

Product pipelines, storage and export facilities at Duqm jetty:

  • Feed for product pipelines, cryogenic and atmospheric storage tanks, vapour recovery systems, marine loading arms and export facilities
  • Integration with existing port and refinery infrastructure, where feasible
     

Supporting systems and studies:

  • Utilities, offsites, flare systems, safety and environmental studies, cost estimates (class 2+10%), project schedules, constructability assessments and EPC tender documentation
Gulf NGL projects

Gulf national oil companies have been allocating significant capital expenditure to the construction or expansion of NGL production facilities.

In September last year, QatarEnergy awarded the main EPC contract for its project to add a fifth NGL train at its fractionation complex in Qatar’s Mesaieed Industrial City. The aim of the project, which is estimated to be worth $2.5bn, is to build a fifth NGL train (NGL-5) with the capacity to process up to 350 million cubic feet a day of rich associated gas from QatarEnergy’s offshore and onshore oil fields.

The main EPC contract for the QatarEnergy NGL-5 project was won by a consortium of India’s Larsen & Toubro Energy Hydrocarbons Onshore and Greece-headquartered Consolidated Contractors Group.

Separately, MEED reported in March that the gas processing business of Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (Adnoc Gas) had selected the main contractor for a project to install a fifth NGL fractionation train at its Ruwais gas processing facility in Abu Dhabi.

The fifth NGL fractionation train will have an output capacity of 22,000 tonnes a day, or about 8 million tonnes a year. The Ruwais NGL Train 5 project represents the second phase of Adnoc Gas’ Rich Gas Development programme, and its budget is estimated to be about $4bn, Peter Van Driel, Adnoc Gas’ chief financial officer, confirmed in February.

ALSO READ: PDO floats tender for major flare gas monetisation scheme
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Indrajit Sen

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