Kuwait has invited companies to submit expressions of interest for its Umm Al-Hayman project, the second water and wastewater sector initiative in the country to be developed under a Public-Private-Partnership (PPP) model.

Announcing the official launch of the project, the Partnerships Technical Bureau (PTB) in Kuwait said the new plant will be built, financed, owned and operated in partnership with private sector companies.

The Partnerships Technical Bureau (PTB) was created by the Kuwaiti government in 2008 to manage private sector participation in the expansion of the country’s infrastructure.

The new plant will increase the southern region’s capacity for dealing with its waste water by nearly 20 times, compared to the existing plant capacity, said a top official.
 
Dr Hashem Altabtabaei, project director at the PTB said, “This project will benefit over 1.25 million Kuwaiti citizens and help lay the foundations for dealing with the country’s wastewater needs for the foreseeable future.'

'It is specifically designed to grow along with the region’s needs, and it’s envisaged that it will have an eventual capacity of 700,000 m3 per day by 2020, from an initial capacity of 500,000 m3,' Altabtabaei remarked.

'Effective management of the country’s wastewater is of paramount importance and this plant will further improve the quality of life of Kuwait’s citizens,' he noted.

A consortium led by HSBC is the lead transaction adviser for the PTB on this ground-breaking assignment.

“This model will allow the Kuwait government to efficiently deploy its financial resources and at the same time ensure that the country benefits from best-in-class technology and knowledge transfer in the water and wastewater sector,” said the HSBC team.

Simon Vaughan Johnson, CEO of HSBC Kuwait said, “This is a positive indication of progress being made on the government's national development plan with strong support from the PTB and HSBC remains fully committed to further supporting such strategic initiatives in the country’s infrastructure sector.”-TradeArabia News Service