Darius Snieckus
OGJ Online
LONDON, May 16 -- This weekend Dolphin Energy Ltd. will issue the first of five prequalification invitations for major engineering and construction management contracts for the Dolphin natural gas megaproject off Qatar, according to partner United Arab Emirates Offsets Group (UOG).
DEL, the company UOG formed to implement the project, said the invitations to tender would be made over 5 days, after which firms wishing to compete for the contracts would have 2 weeks to submit prequalification statements.
The offers to tender follow the signing in March of a $4 billion deal by Qatar Petroleum and the UOG that set out the terms for transport of some 2 bcfd of gas from North field off Qatar to Abu Dhabi and Dubai starting as early as 2003.
Kicked off in March 1999 by the government-sponsored UOG, the Dolphin gas initiative involves the development of upstream facilities to produce gas from the field's Khuff formation, transportation infrastructure linked to a gas gathering and processing plant at Ras Laffan -- where condensate, ethane, sulfhur, and liquefied petroleum gas will be stripped from the wet gas -- and a 350 km subsea pipeline to Taweelah in Abu Dhabi and Jebel Ali in Dubai.
TotalFinaElf AS and Enron Corp. signed a 25-year project development agreement in March 2000 to advance the upstream and pipeline sides of the envisioned GCC gas grid.
The prequalification invitations will be made this order: engineering and inspection for existing UAE pipelines; environmental impact assessment survey for the offshore gas facilities; offshore pipeline route and onshore facility survey for the pipeline network; midstream front end engineering and design (FEED), procurement services, and construction management for the pipeline, gas receiving and metering facilities at Taweelah and Jebel Ali and the riser platform; and upstream FEED, procurement services, and construction management of the production platforms in North field, as well as a 2 bcfd gas processing plant, compression facilities, product storage, and associated facilities at Ras Laffan.
DEL plans to deliver first gas to its customers in Abu Dhabi and Dubai in 2005 to meet demand that is rising 10%/year.
Contact Darius V. Snieckus at [email protected]
