Officials after signing the Shuaibah seawater desalination plant contract.

Leading South Korean group Doosan Heavy Industries & Construction Company said it has secured a 470 billion won ($422.05 million) construction contract for a seawater reverse osmosis (SWRO) desalination plant in Saudi Arabia.

The contract for building the nation’s largest SWRO plant in Shuaibah, 110 km south of Jeddah, on the Red Sea coast, was awarded by Saudi Arabia’s Saline Water Conversion Corporation (SWCC), reported Business Korea.

As per the deal, Doosan Heavy will complete the construction of the plant as the engineering, procurement, and construction (EPC) contractor.

Once the facility is completed, it will process 400,000 tonnes of seawater into fresh water a day, to meet the requirements of 1.3 million people, and supply it to western Saudi Arabia.

With the latest deal, the Korean group has re-entered the Saudi Arabian seawater desalination market after five long years, stated the report.

The company had last worked on the desalination plant project at Ras Al Khair in 2010 and Yanbu seawater desalination plant Phase Three deal in 2012, it added.