Saudi Aramco hands $500m power gen order to GE

GE's business in Saudi Arabia is brisk.

GE will supply Saudi Aramco with power generation equipment worth nearly US$500 million to Saudi Aramco, which will use the additional 729MW of power for the expansion of its the Shaybah gas-oil processing facilities.

To generate the additional megawatts, GE will be delivering 11 gas turbine-generators, 44 compressors, motors and services. This will bring the total supply of GE gas turbines to Saudi Aramco to more than 110 and the number of GE centrifugal compressors to nearly 100.

Shaybah, which is Saudi Aramco’s most remote oil field, is located in the southeastern section of the Kingdom. It already is highly productive, following a 50 percent capacity upgrade in June 2009 from half-a-million barrels per day (bpd) to 750,000 bpd of Arabian Extra Light crude. The new expansion is expected to enable Saudi Aramco to further increase crude production to 1 million bpd and increase the gas-oil ratio (GOR) of the field from 1,800 to 7,200 standard cubic feet per stock tank barrel (scf/stb).

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key feature of the expansion, the valuable natural gas liquid (NGL) components from gas produced at Shaybah will be recovered through the construction of the new Sabkha NGL recovery plant which will process 2.4 billion standard cubic feet per day (scfd) of low-sulfur sweet gas and extract 264,000 bpd of NGL. The gas is used in petrochemical applications.

The GE Frame 7EA gas turbines for Shaybah's expansion project have been used in previous Saudi Aramco applications. Similar GE units have been operating since 1998 in Shaybah, one of the most challenging environments in Saudi Arabia. The 7EA gas turbines to be delivered to Shaybah will be equipped with GE's advanced Dry Low NOx combustion systems to reduce emissions.

All 44 GE centrifugal compressors will be driven by GE electric motors. GE will ship the equipment during the first half of 2012. In addition, services and training will be provided through the GE Energy Manufacturing Technology Center in Dammam, Saudi Arabia. The 10,000 square meter facility represents a $100 million investment in the largest GE center of excellence worldwide.

With a presence that spans almost 80 years in Saudi Arabia, GE has expanded its energy presence in the Kingdom through public-private partnerships and a strong footprint of facilities in service repair support and customer training centers in power, water and oil and gas. With more than 800 GE employees, Saudi Arabia has the largest GE workforce in the Middle East.
 

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