Saudi Aramco has awarded several contracts for the engineering, procurement, and construction phases of a new refinery and associated terminals in the kingdom.

Estimated to cost $7 billion, the refinery will be built in over an area of 12 sq km at Jazan Economic City. It is expected to have a 400,000-barrel per-day capacity to process Arabian heavy and medium crude oils and produce gasoline, ultra-low sulphur diesel, benzene and paraxylene.

Jazan refinery’s major contract winners are Petrofac Saudi Arabia; Hyundai Arabia; Hanwha Engineering and Construction (Korea); SK Engineering & Construction (Korea); Tecnicas Reunidas (Spain); JGC Corporation; and Hitachi Plant Technologies (Japan).

The local Al Ali Al Ajmi Group also won a deal to prepare the site.

The construction of the associated terminal on the Red Sea will manage very large crude carriers to supply crude oil to the refinery and export the refined products produced from the refinery. The contracts were signed last month.

Jazan refinery is expected to be completed by late 2016.