Iraq’s state-owned Basra Oil Company (BOC) and China Petroleum Pipeline Engineering (CPP) have signed a $2.5bn contract to build a 950-kilometre seawater pipeline network to supply a planned water processing facility that is part of the Common Seawater Supply Project (CSSP).

The project will be supervised by Austria’s ILF Consulting Engineers.

Water from the processing plant is expected to be injected into some of the country’s largest oil fields, including Rumaila, Zubair, West Qurna 1, West Qurna 2 and Majnoon. It is also expected to be used in the Maysan and Dhi Qar fields.

According to a statement from Iraq’s Oil Ministry, the injected water will help maintain reservoir pressure and sustain crude oil production at these fields.

CPP is a subsidiary of state-owned China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC).

The CSSP’s planned water treatment facility is expected to have a capacity of 5 million barrels a day (b/d), potentially increasing to 7-8 million b/d in later phases.

Iraq’s Minister of Petroleum Hayyan Abdul Ghani said that the contract signed with CPP was “in addition” to contracts recently signed by France’s TotalEnergies.

TotalEnergies is responsible for the CSSP as part of the larger $27bn Gas Growth Integrated Project (GGIP). It is unclear why the contract with CPP was just signed by BOC and has not been signed by TotalEnergies.

Iraq approved a $2.45bn contract with the South Korean contractor Hyundai Engineering & Construction (Hyundai E&C) for engineering, procurement and construction of a seawater treatment plant in August.