Four consortiums led by global players – JGC, GS Inima, Acwa and Tedagua – are in the race to develop a seawater desalination plant in Sharqiyah area of Oman, with a capacity of 17.6 million gallons per day.

The Oman Power and Water Procurement Company (OPWP) is expected to award the contract for the Sharqiyah independent water project (IWP) this month on a build, own, and operate (BOO) basis, reported the Times of Oman.

The plant is expected to start operations in the third quarter of 2019, it added.

A request for proposal (RfP) for both Sharqiyah and Salalah IWPs was issued in March 2016 by OPWP, which oversees all new water and power capacity in the sultanate.

Another IWP in the sultanate’s southern Salalah region, which will have a desalination capacity of 22 million gallons per day, got delayed and the same will be awarded in the fourth quarter of 2017, said the report.

The total investment for both the desalination projects is estimated at RO105 million ($272 million), it added.