MUSCAT: India’s McNally Bharat Engineering (MBE) Company on Thursday said its 50:50 special purpose vehicle (SPV) with the Sultanate’s EMC Group has bagged a $315 million contract from Sohar Bitumen for building its bitumen refinery in Sohar.
“The share of MBE in the order shall be $157 million. The delivery period of the project is 24 months from the date of receipt of advance from the customer,” the company said in a Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) filing.
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The bitumen project is linked with the multi-billion-dollar Sohar Refinery Improvement Project as the feedstock will be from the refinery and Oman is going to produce bitumen for the first time.
A senior official of Oman Oil Refineries and Petroleum Industries Company (Orpic) last month said that the bitumen project will meet the entire demand of bitumen in the country.
Bitumen is in demand due to road infrastructure projects across the country, especially in fast developing industrial hubs like Duqm.
Oman has been entirely dependent on imports, primarily from neighbouring Iran and the United Arab Emirates, for its requirements of bitumen which is used for mainly asphalting in road construction projects. Imports of bitumen have burgeoned on the back of escalating investments in road construction and related infrastructure programmes.
According to earlier reports, the bitumen project will have an installed capacity of around 300,000 tonnes per annum, which is aimed at meeting the entire demand of Sultanate’s yearly requirement of bitumen, particularly for road asphalting purposes.
A joint venture of Daelim Industrial and Petrofac International is currently executing the expansion and modernisation of Orpic’s Sohar Refinery.
