A South Korean construction firm has secured a contract for a gas plant in Saudi Arabia valued at nearly $7.4 billion (10 trillion won). This achievement marks the third-largest project in the history of Korean overseas construction, a sector with records dating back to 1965. It also represents a significant milestone following the visit of Korea’s President Yoon Suk-yeol to Saudi Arabia in October last year, where he pledged to enhance bilateral construction cooperation. This success signals a positive step toward the company’s ambitious goal of acquiring $40 billion in overseas construction orders this year.
Samsung E&A (previously known as Samsung Engineering & Construction) announced on Apr. 3 that it had been awarded a contract to construct a gas processing facility and related infrastructure as part of the expansion project for the Fadhili gas plant in Saudi Arabia. The project, commissioned by Saudi Arabia’s state-owned oil company Aramco, is valued at $6.07 billion (8.2 trillion won). It is the largest project by a Korean company in Saudi Arabia, surpassing the $5 billion Amirah petrochemical plant secured by Hyundai E&C in June last year.
On the same day, GS E&C revealed it had obtained a contract to enhance the sulfur recovery unit at the Fadhili gas plant, with the order valued at $1.12 billion (1.6 trillion won). The combined total of the contracts awarded to both companies reaches $7.29 billion (9.8 trillion won), positioning it as Korea’s third-largest overseas construction order. This follows the Barakah Nuclear Power Plant project in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) in 2009, valued at $19.1 billion, and the Bismayah New City project in Iraq in 2012, at $7.7 billion.
The Fadhili gas plant, located in the Jubail Industrial Park approximately 350 kilometers northeast of Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia, refines natural gas extracted from offshore fields. The refined natural gas is then distributed to industrial sites and residential areas. In response to the increasing demand for gas, the Saudi government has initiated an expansion project to boost the plant’s processing capacity from 70 million cubic meters to 170 million cubic meters per day. This expanded capacity is 1.8 times the daily gas consumption of Seoul, which stands at 60.2 million cubic meters.
Aramco plans to invest $7.7 billion to complete the expansion by November 2027. Samsung E&S and GS E&C will cover 94.7% of the project expenses. The $200 million civil works tender received no bids from local companies and was awarded to the Saudi firm Nesma & Partners.
An official from Samsung E&A said, “For the bidding process, we extended invitations to a select few companies from Korea and Japan, with whom Aramco has maintained a longstanding collaborative relationship.”
