Japan’s Toyota Tsusho has won the contract to design a 1,300 km oil export pipeline from Uganda to Kenya’s coast
The pipeline designer would be required to supervise the construction of a fibre optic cable from Uganda’s oilfields in Hoima through the Lokichar Basin in northwest Kenya, where the country has found oil deposits, to Kenya’s proposed Lamu Port.
Joseph Njoroge, Kenyan Energy Ministry’s principal secretary, said, “Toyota Tsusho have already been awarded the contract for the feasibility study and preliminary engineering design, their final report is expected by mid-April next year.”
The consultant is also expected to design tank terminals in Hoima, Lokichar and Lamu, the Ministry said.
Oil discoveries in Uganda and Kenya and gas deposits found offshore Tanzania and Mozambique have turned East Africa into a frontier for hydrocarbon exploration, Reuters reported.
Landlocked Uganda is planning to start crude production in 2018, while in neighbouring Kenya, Tullow Oil and Africa Oil are expected to submit development plans in late 2015.
Kenya estimates its crude oil reserves to be about one billion barrels, which experts have said is enough to make a pipeline viable even without Uganda, which estimates its reserves at 6.5bn barrels.
In June this year, the two countries had invited bids for a consultant to oversee a feasibility study and initial design for the construction of the pipeline estimated to cost about US$4.5bn.
