State-owned utility Nama Dhofar Services has tendered a desalination plant project and two reverse osmosis (RO) plant expansion schemes in Oman’s Dhofar governorate.

The first tender covers the development of the Al-Houtah desalination plant under a build-operate-transfer (BOT) model.

The contract includes the execution, financing, operation and maintenance of the facility.

The Al-Houtah project is being procured as part of efforts to expand water infrastructure in the governorate, which is Oman’s largest by area.

Alongside the desalination project, Nama Dhofar Services has opened bidding for two additional tenders to expand existing RO plants and water supply networks in Barbazum and Dhahboon.

The bid submission deadlines for the Al-Houtah project and for the two expansion projects are 18 May and 1 April, respectively.

According to the notice, a site visit for Al-Houtah has been scheduled for interested bidders on 30 March.

Dhofar upgrades

Nama Dhofar Services, part of Nama Group, announced last year that it was planning a major wastewater network upgrade and extension project in Dhofar governorate.

In October, the utility awarded a three-year contract to Muscat-based Monenco Consulting Engineers to provide consultancy services for the project.

Previously, it commissioned the RO45m ($117m) Sahalnout sewerage project in Salalah, one of the largest wastewater infrastructure schemes in the Dhofar region.

As MEED understands, Nama Power & Water Procurement (NamaPWP) had also been planning to build a desalination plant in Dhofar governorate with a capacity of 100,000 cubic metres a day (cm/d).

According to MEED Projects, the scheme was originally expected to be tendered in 2023, but so far, it has yet to progress.