Jubail: the biggest is getting bigger

KFIP has Completed AN 800,000m? petrochemical quays with five new berths that can accomodate tankers.
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In 1983 Saudi Arabia’s Jubail Industrial City was cited in the Guinness Book of Records as the largest engineering and construction project ever attempted. In 2009 it’s still getting bigger. Benjamin Millington went onsite to gauge the scale of expansion.

Forty years ago Jubail was nothing more than a coastal village in eastern Saudi Arabia, which relied on fishing and pearl diving to drive the local economy.

Today it is the world’s largest industrial city and home to a multi-billion dollar petrochemicals industry that accounts for 7% of Saudi Arabia’s gross domestic product.

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The rapid transformation was kick-started in the mid 1970s when the King established the Royal Commission for Jubail and Yanbu – a government entity dedicated to the development of two industrial cities; Jubail on the east and Yanbu on the west coast.

Over the next 35 years the two cities rose out of the desert sands with the help of US engineering giant Bechtel acting as consultants on the project from master planning to construction management, a relationship that continues to this day.

Currently the Royal Commission and Bechtel’s Saudi entity, the Saudi Arabian Bechtel Company (Sabco), is overseeing a massive expansion of Jubail Industrial City, which includes huge new residential areas, a university, bigger port facilities, a rail network and a new industrial zone dubbed Jubail Two.

Jubail Two
Covering an area of 84km² Jubail Two is located 8km to the west of the original industrial zone of Jubail One, which already contains a range of primary, secondary and support industries, the majority of which are related to petrochemicals.

Similarly, the industries destined for operation in Jubail Two will also be centred on petrochemicals, including a US $8 billion (SAR30 billion) refinery to be built and operated by Satorp – a joint venture between Saudi Aramco and France’s Total.

The refinery will have the capacity to process 400,000 barrels of Arabian heavy crude a day to produce gasoline, diesel, jet fuel and petrochemical products for export and domestic consumption.

Satorp has started some site preparation for the refinery but is reportedly delaying main construction contracts to take advantage of cheaper construction costs expected as a result of the financial crisis.

Meanwhile the Royal Commission and Sabco are busily working to provide Jubail Two with all necessary infrastructure including power, telecommunications, roads, water and wastewater.

Sabco’s manager of projects, Abdullah Al Satarwah  says work on the infrastructure for Jubail Two is being completed in four stages, each stage covering roughly 20km².