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Saudi Arabia will complete first phase of gas grid expansion in 2017

Saudi Arabia's national oil and gas company Saudi Aramco plans to complete the first phase of its gas transmission network expansion project by the end of 2017.



To meet the rising gas demand, Saudi Aramco has launched a two-stage gas grid expansion project, adding two gas compression stations in the Red Sea region; the first one, 2.5 bcf/d (70.5 mcm/d) Wasit gas plant, is at the pre-commissioning stage and should be in operations by the end of this year to meet the commissioning of the Rabigh-2 power plant. The second gas plant, Midyan, will supply 75 mcf/d (2.1 mcm/d) of gas to a new power plant in Duba. Overall, the first phase will raise the transmission capacity from the current 8.4 bcf/d (237 mcm/d or 86.5 bcm/year) to 9.6 bcf/d (271 mcm/d or 99 bcm/year).



The second phase of the expansion project will add nearly 1,000 km of new gas pipelines linking the eastern and western coasts and will raise the capacity of the Saudi gas pipeline system to 12.5 bcf/d (353 mcm/d or 129 bcm/year) of gas by 2020. Saudi Aramco is investing US$13.3bn (SR50bn) in the Fadhili gas processing project, expected in 2019, which will be able to process gas from onshore and offshore fields.