Kuwait's proposed Umm Al-Hayman plant
Kuwait has invited bids from the private sector to help develop a wastewater treatment plant in the south of the country, which could be worth US$1.5bn, according to HSBC.
The Partnerships Technical Bureau (PTB), which manages PPPs on behalf of the government, will work with private companies to build, finance and operate the Umm Al-Hayman plant.
The project will be funded by a combination of state funds, equity and debt from commercial banks and export credit agencies.
The PTB’s lead transactional adviser is HSBC. Matthew Nathan, the bank’s head of infrastructure and PPP, project finance MENA, believes that there shouldn’t be a problem finding funding and that there will be strong interest from Europe, Asia and the Americas.
“There are not many places in the world where you have Greenfield wastewater treatment plant opportunities,” he said, explaining that strong demographic and economic growth alongside a growing population have created demand.
Umm Al-Hayman is scheduled to be operational by 2015 when it will be able to process 20 times as much wastewater as the southern region can process today. The plant will initially have a capacity of 500,000 m3 a day, rising to 700,000 m3 within five years.
This is the second such announcement by the PTB in less than a year. In May, it invited tenders for a power and desalination plant in Az Zour North.
Nathan expects the bidding process to be completed by July.
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