World Report

n February of this year, Kuwait opened a new state-of-the-art oil pier 1.2 miles offshore from the country’s largest refinery, Mina Al- Ahmadi. Touted as the largest and most advanced in the Middle East, the Mina Al-Ahmadi pier forms part of an ambitious strategy to promote the country’s oil output and exports. The new facility can accommodate supertankers with a capacity up to 350,000 tons, as well as natural gas and methanol tankers. Six platforms will enable the pier to handle four tankers at once and to reduce loading time from 48 hours to 30 hours. The pier, which took three years to complete and represents an investment of $342 million, will serve the emirate throughout the next 30 years. It is also a part of the upgrading of the port, which suffered extensive damage during the 1990 Iraqi invasion. Simultaneously, Kuwait has ordered seven new tankers, with the first to be delivered in 2006, and is actively seeking new markets for the country’s planned increase in production.

- Vision 2020 rises to match global demand -

uwait’s energy sector is set to undergo an extensive expansion and reconstruction over the next 15 years. Vision 2020, the strategic plan of Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (KPC), aims to increase production from current levels of 2.2 million barrels per day (bpd) to 4 million, and refining capacity from the current 889,200 bpd to 1.3 million bpd in an effort to match the global rise in energy demand, especially from up-and-coming Asian markets such as China. The successful realization of Vision 2020 entails further exploiting the country’s northern oil fields, constructing a new refinery and renovating the three existing refineries, as well as developing value-added upstream activities. The expansion of KPC’s petrochemicals activities both inside and outside of Kuwait and the upgrading of Kuwait’s oil transport sector are also key objectives. KPC has estimated that the plan will require a total investment of roughly US$55 billion (£33 billion) before its completion.