The Gulf Cooperation Council Interconnection Authority (GCCIA) on 7 February finalized contracts with five subcontractors for the construction of a 295km, 400kV double circuit transmission line that will link its Wafra (Z) substation in Kuwait to the 400kV Fao substation in Iraq. Work on the new 1.8GW capacity line will take 24 months, implying February 2025 completion. As such Gulf electricity supplies are slated to reach southern Iraq almost five years after the initial planned date of summer 2020 (MEES, 13 September 2019).

A GCCIA source tells MEES that power exports from the first 500MW phase will begin “before summer [2025], inshallah.” The $220mn project is financed by Kuwait Fund for Arab Economic Development and Qatar Fund and will be delivered in five tranches inside Kuwait and Iraq by Saudi Arabia’s National Contracting Company, India’s Kalpataru and KEC in addition to Turkey’s Çalık Enerji. Network solutions are to be provided by Saudi-French company Cegelec Saudi. (CONTINUED - 152 WORDS)