Austrian consultant appointed for Saudi Arabia’s Amaala utilities project
Austria’s ILF Consulting Engineers has been awarded the technical advisory contract for the planned major utilities project at the Amaala mega-tourism project in Saudi Arabia, which will be developed as a public-private partnership (PPP) utilities project
Austria’s ILF Consulting Engineers has been awarded the technical advisory contract for the planned major utilities project at the Amaala mega-tourism project in Saudi Arabia, which will be developed as a public-private partnership (PPP) utilities project.
Energy & Utilities reported in October 2021 that developers had been issued with tender documents for the planned PPP multi-utilities project at the Amaala development.
The PPP package will involve the development of fully integrated utilities infrastructure for the Amaala project, similar to the packages that have been previously tendered for the Red Sea tourism and Qiddiya city megadevelopments.
As with the Red Sea Tourism and NEOM schemes, Amaala is being developed by state sovereign wealth vehicle the Public Investment Fund (PIF).
The Amaala project, which is being designed as luxury tourism development focusing on “recuperation, wellness and recreation”, will be developed alongside the Red Sea Tourism and NEOM projects along the Red Sea Coast of Saudi Arabia.
The scope of the Amaala utilities package will include:
- Development of renewable energy capacity of 112MW-142MW
- Development of a reverse osmosis (RO) desalination plant to meet an expected demand of 143,000 cubic metres a day (cm/d). The first phase will involve the development of 50,000 cm/d to 69,400 cm/d
- Sewage treatment plant (STP) – to treat up to 15,600 cm/d of sewage water, with the first phase planned to meet demand of 8,200 cm/d
- Waste management – to meet total demand of 96 tonnes a day, with first phase due to cover 55 tonnes a day
- District cooling: Develop district cooling capacity to meet a total demand of 72,500 refrigerated tonnes (TR), with the first phase to meet demand of 40,000 TR
It was announced in January 2021 that John Pagano, CEO of the Red Sea Tourism Development Company (TRSDC) would also become CEO of Amaala while continuing as CEO of the TRSDC.
In November 2020, a consortium led by Saudi Arabia’s Acwa Power was awarded the PPP contract by TRSDC to develop the utilities and related infrastructure for the Red Sea following a competitive tendering process.
The PPP contract will include the provision of power and water production, sewage treatment and solid waste treatment. The Red Sea Development Company is owned by sovereign wealth vehicle Public Investment Fund (PIF), and the PIF will provide the guarantee for the 25-year offtake agreement.
Under the first phase of the Red Sea development, which is due to be commissioned in 2022, power generation capacity will be required to service a peak demand of 210MW. Power is planned to be generated for the first phase from photovoltaic (PV) solar and wind energy, with 1GWh of battery storage included.
The 1GWh is expected to allow the resort to remain completely off-grid and powered by renewables day and night.
Under the second phase, which is due to be commissioned by 2030, power generation capacity will be required to meet peak demand of 360MW. The client is planning for geothermal and concentrated solar power (CSP) to add additional capacity by 2030.
For water production, two seawater reverse osmosis (SWRO) plants will be developed with a capacity of 30,000 cubic metres a day (cm/d) under the first phase. The demand will be split between potable water, 21,000 cm/d, and irrigation top-up, 9,000 cm/d.
Under the second phase, an additional SWRO plant will be developed in addition to brine squeezer and chlor-alkali technologies to meet expected demand of up to 50,000 cm/d, split 39,000cm/d and 11,000cm/d between potable water and irrigation top-up respectively.
The selected developer will also be required to provide a sewage treatment plant (STP) with a capacity to treat up to 18,000 cm/d of sewage under the first phase of the project through a constructed wetlands scheme. The peak sewage flow of the development is expected to reach 34,000 cm/d by 2030.
For the waste treatment development, the PPP contract will cover collection, automatic recovery and waste-to-energy production for up to 30 tonnes per day (t/d) under the first day. This will rise to 55 t/d by 2030,
TRSDC was established in line with the kingdom’s Vision 2030 economic reform plan to diversify the country’s economy and increase the kingdom’s tourism sector.
Under the first phase development, TRSDC is planning to develop five islands, two inland sites and deliver 3,000 hotel keys to accommodate 300,000 visitors a year by 2022. By 2030, the client hopes to have developed 22 islands, six inland sites and have delivered 8,000 hotel rooms to service up to 1 million visitors a year.
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