Iraq Looks For Investors To Build 70,000 Bpd Refinery

Iraq is inviting companies to bid to build a 70,000-bpd oil refinery near the town of Haditha in the Anbar governorate, the oil ministry said on Thursday.

Investors willing to take part in the tender have until June 14, 2018, to file offers, the ministry said. The Anbar refinery project is offered on a Build-Own-Operate (BOO) or a Build-Own-Operate-Transfer (BOOT) basis.

Building the 70,000-bpd refinery at Anbar is part of Iraq’s program to boost its oil processing capacity and reduce its oil product imports.

Earlier this week, Iraq’s Oil Ministry said that the country aims to reduce its oil product imports by 25 percent as it is seeking to refurbish and restart oil refineries after it expelled ISIS from its territory, without giving a timeline for that 25-percent import reduction.

Iraq, OPEC’s second-largest oil producer, is adding more production units at refineries in the central and southern parts of the country and is producing more oil products from processing natural gas liquids.

Iraq has recently restarted production units at some refineries. The country is also seeking investment for refinery projects in Kirkuk, Maysan, Nasiriya, Faw, Anbar, and Nineveh.

The country is looking to attract billions of U.S. dollars in its refinery sector, and recently offered a total of 18 investment opportunities in the chemicals, petrochemicals, fertilizers, and refinery sectors. Iraq wants to attract investment mostly in the downstream, planning the construction of new refineries with different capacities, including one at the Al-Faw Port with a 300,000-bpd capacity.

At an investment conference on rebuilding Iraq, Oil Minister Jabbar al-Luiebi said last month that the country needed US$4 billion worth of investments in the downstream. That investment is planned to raise Iraq’s refining capacity to 1.5 million bpd by 2021, of which 500,000 bpd would be exported, according to the minister.

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

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