Saline Water Conversion Corporation (SWCC) has announced that the request for proposals has been issued to all the seven prequalified bidders to participate in the potential privatisation of Ras Al Khair integrated desalination and power plant. 

 

Announcing the launch of the RFP phase, SWCC said this was an important step for Ras Al Khair (RAK) plant privatisation, where seven strategic qualified companies and consortiums have been invited to submit their bids.

 

Ras Al Khair has been selected as the first asset for privatisation as part of the larger privatisation of SWCC’s production assets, which is overseen by the Privatization Supervisory Committee for the water sector of Saudi Arabia, it stated. 

 

Seven leading energy project developer/developer consortiums are in the race for the Ras Al Khair plant privatisation project. These include regional heavyweight Acwa Power; French utility Engie and India's largest energy conglomerate NTPC in addition to Japanese groups Marubeni Corporation and Jera Company.

 

Also consortiums of China Power International Holding/Ajlan & Bros Energy Company and China Huadian Hong Kong Company/Beijing Enterprises Water Group (BEWG) are in the fray.

 

On selection, the winning bidder will get to own a 60 per cent stake in the Ras Al Khair company, which will be responsible for the management, operation and maintenance of the plant. It is an operating asset with 1.05 million cu m desalination capacity and 2.65 GW of power capacity. 

 

According to SWCC, a majority sale is envisaged with the proposed contractual structure in line with market standard IWPP/IWP (independent water and power project/independent water project) framework in the kingdom. The incoming investor will also have the option to take over operation and maintenance (O&M) of the plant, it added.