Kuwait to spend $100 billion on oil projects to raise its output

OPEC’s third largest producer, Kuwait, is planning to spend about $100 billion on oil projects for the upcoming five years, an online news website reported Monday.

“Around $100 billion has been earmarked for oil projects ... 60 percent of it on upstream projects inside and outside Kuwait,” Middle East Online quoted CEO of national oil conglomerate Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (KPC), Faruq al-Zanki, as saying.

The plan is to raise Kuwait’s output capacity to 4.0 million barrels per day from its current 3.0 million, Zanki said on the sidelines of the Kuwait Energy Projects conference organized by the Middle East Economic Digest (MEED).

According to the CEO, part of the spending plan is the construction of a new 615,000 bpd refinery and a clean fuel project to modernize two of the country’s three refineries, both costing $30 billion.

Zanki also said that National refiner Kuwait National Petroleum Co. (KNPC), a subsidiary of KPC, is expected to tender two projects early next year after they have been delayed due to political squabbling.

The two projects are projected to raise Kuwait's refining capacity to 1.4 million bpd from the current 930,000 bpd.

Kuwait is also in advanced talks with China and Vietnam for multi-billion-dollar joint ventures to build two oil refinery and petrochemical complexes.