Hyundai Engineering & Construction (Hyundai E&C) has signed a ₩4.39 trillion ($3.16 billion) contract to build a seawater treatment facility in Iraq, reports The Korea Herald.
The project is part of the Common Seawater Supply Project, which is designed to support crude oil production in Iraq’s southern oil fields by injecting seawater into reservoirs. The plant, to be located at Khor Al Zubair Port about 500 kilometers southeast of Baghdad, will have a daily processing capacity of five million barrels.
Freshwater produced from the facility will be supplied to nearby oil fields, including West Qurna and Rumaila. The project involves joint investment from TotalEnergies of France, QatarEnergy LNG, and Iraq’s Basra Oil Company.
Construction is expected to take 49 months. Hyundai E&C described the project as its largest in Iraq since the completion of the $6 billion Karbala oil refinery in 2023.
In a statement, Hyundai E&C said: “This contract was primarily driven by the strong trust placed in Hyundai E&C, which has carried out major national projects in Iraq over the years, contributing to economic growth despite challenges such as wars and Covid-19.”
Separately, in 2023, Hyundai E&C and Hyundai Engineering began work on one of the world’s largest petrochemical facilities in Ulsan, South Korea. The Shaheen project, developed by S-OIL, a subsidiary of Saudi Aramco, is being built at S-OIL’s Ulsan refinery with an investment of ₩9.26 trillion and is scheduled for completion in 2026.
