Samsung Engineering wins $680 mn gas plant project in Malaysia

Samsung Engineering Co. has won a $680 million gas plant construction order in Malaysia from UK-headquartered energy giant Shell plc’s subsidiary Sarawak Shell Bhd, the Samsung Group’s construction arm announced on Wednesday.

The gas plant will be built in Bintulu, Sarawak in East Malaysia, to process 800 million cubic feet (ft³) of gas a day. The plant will remove sulfur-containing impurities from the gas -- which is extracted from the deepwater gas field -- and send the high purity gas to liquefaction facilities to be used as an element in liquefied natural gas (LNG).  

Samsung Engineering is planning to complete the project, named Shell Onshore Gas Plant for Rosmari Marjoram, via engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) by 2025. It will have participated in all the stages of the project since joining the front-end engineering design (FEED) in 2020, which is in the early project planning stages.   

Via the deal with Shell’s subsidiary, the Korean construction company will accelerate its expansion into the global oil market, Samsung Engineering said.   

Samsung Engineering has accumulated technologies to win FEED and EPC orders on the global stage. The Korean firm clinched a $3.6 billion deal to build part of the refinery facility in Dos Bocas, Mexico in October 2020. It was the single-largest project that a Korean company had ever won. Samsung Engineering also won a $1.07 billion project order from Malaysian petrochemical firm Sarawak Petchem Sdn Bhd to build a methanol plant in December 2020.   

The Korean firm has carried out more than 10 projects in Malaysia, including clean hydrogen development and methanol plant construction in Sarawak. It expects to fully utilize its current human resources, equipment and network in Sarawak for the Shell onshore gas plant project.

Samsung Engineering has won overseas projects with a combined worth of $1.7 billion since January this year, ranking top among the Korean construction companies. Alongside Hyundai Engineering & Construction, it was selected as the official Korean partner of Namaat, the Saudi Arabian Oil Company (Aramco)’s industrial investment program earlier this month. 

Write to Kyung-Min Kang at kkm126@hankyung.com
Jihyun Kim edited this article.