Dammam- The Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman visited the Eastern Province from Riyadh for the kickoff for a multi-project initiative covering oil, gas, and economic sectors brought by Saudi National oil giant, Aramco.
Perhaps the highlight of the mega development projects is the King Abdulaziz Center for World Culture, which is an extension of Saudi Aramco’s corporate vision and a continuation of its work to create a knowledge based society.
King Salman will launch the mega oil projects of Saudi Aramco, and the King Abdulaziz Center for World Culture at a ceremony to be held in Dhahran on Friday.
Among the scheduled projects is increasing production capacity of Manifa field, the fifth largest oil field in the world, located offshore in the Arabian Gulf.
The projects would contribute significantly to realizing the Kingdom’s Vision 2030 through setting the ground for sustainable expansion and diversification of the national economy and increase its production capacity, in addition to strengthening the position of Saudi Aramco as the largest integrated energy and petrochemical company in the world.
The King Abdulaziz is considered one of the most ambitious and unique Saudi initiatives and is regarded as a great contribution by Saudi Aramco to the Saudi society, especially the youth.
In a press statement, the Minister of Energy, Industry and Mineral Resources Eng. Khalid bin Abdulaziz Al-Faleh announced King Salman inaugurating the projects constitutes a strong back up for both Aramco and the initiative, given that the projects pave the way for laying forth the ground to build a robust and competitive national sector of energy and bolstering the Saudi Aramco status as a world leading integrated petrochemical and energy related company, reported SPA.
The Manifa Arabian heavy crude program is part of the development of the Saudi oilfields, which are expected to see an increase in production to over 12.5 million barrels a day from 11 million bpd. The project involves the development of the Manifa offshore oilfield and the construction and expansion of a new processing infrastructure to handle an additional 900,000bpd of Arabian heavy crude oil.
The second project is the Wasit Gas Plant. As a stand-alone gas plant, Wasit’s integrated facilities will process 2.5 billion scfd (standard cubic feet per day) of non-associated offshore gas. The fields are in about 50 km of water, 150 km northeast of Jubail.
The expansion of Saudi Aramco’s Khurais oil field is the third major project. The Khurais Arabian Light Crude Increment is an onshore oil field development. The fourth major project, to be launched during the royal visit, is the expansion of the Shaybah oil field in the Empty Quarter (Rubal Khali).