Thirty years ago, Saudi Arabia launched a project to build a city from the sand up.

Today, that city is an industrial capital with a population of more than 100,000 that accounts for more than seven per cent of the kingdom’s gross domestic product (GDP), where wooden dhows have made way for container ships and a single pier has evolved into a bustling industrial port that serves 38 primary and secondary industries.
Jubail Industrial City is one of the world’s largest civil engineering projects in modern times and is, in fact, now set to double in size.
Work has been launched on the first construction phase of the new multi-billion dollar industrial city using Saudi Arabia’s high oil revenues to boost spending on infrastructure projects. Crown Prince Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz, Deputy Premier and Commander of the National Guard laid the foundation stone for the multi-billion-riyal industrial city project late last year.
The success of Jubail I and the ongoing drive to minimise the heavy reliance of the economy on oil revenue has encouraged the Saudi Arabian government to launch the second industrial zone situated 3 km from Jubail I. 
The Jubail II industrialisation programme is aimed at capitalising on the country’s abundant hydrocarbon resources to optimise economic and social benefits for the kingdom and to further strengthen a globally-competitive petrochemical industry. Supporting Saudi Arabia’s national development strategy, the new development is projected to double the size of the Jubail Industrial City by 6,200 hectares.

Construction
The Royal Commission for Jubail and Yanbu (RCJY) has allocated $3.8 billion to fund all the infrastructural facilities including roads, utilities (gas and electricity), seawater cooling, potable water, waste water treatment, feedstock and a product pipeline corridor to King Fahd Industrial Port as well as the expansion of the main port.
The utilities for the new industrial park will be extended from the existing park across Saudi Aramco’s 1.5-km wide Kuwait-Ras Tanura (KRT) corridor.
Last February, Prince Saud ibn Abdullah ibn Thunayan, chairman of the Royal Commission, signed a contract with Abdullah ibn Abdul Mohsen Al-Khudairy & Sons to carry out a number of projects related to the second industrial city which will cost $18 billion to build.
Jubail II will be developed in four phases, with the initial phase accommodating nine industries and covering 1,900 hectares of the total 6,200-hectare development. The designs for the infrastructure facilities, including tunnels, superstructures, pipelines, and transport routes to the port were completed last year. The first phase will be complete by 2007 and the first industrial enterprise is expected to start production as early as 2008.
The RCJY has asked Bechtel, which handled Jubail 1, to manage Jubail II.
The development team is adhering to the original master plan, building the infrastructure in an open space that was set aside 30 years ago. Residential areas will be added within the existing community to accommodate up to 50,000 additional residents by 2024.
The biggest technical challenge facing the construction of Jubail II will be in accommodating Saudi Aramco’s KRT corridor, the main North-South pipeline for oil and gas.
The open canal method for cooling process water that worked so well for Jubail I cannot be utilised for Jubail II due to limitations posed by the new site’s elevation, explains a spokesman for Bechtel. The solution calls for a network of 4-m diameter pipelines with an initial flow of 200,000 cu m per hour.
However, the RCJY have taken a ‘giant leap’ in terms of its capabilities since the foundation of Jubail I in the 1970s. The technology transfer programme mastered successfully by Bechtel in Jubail I has contributed to the development of an experienced project management organisation consisting of 283 people. Hence, development in Jubail II will be largely managed and built by local resources.

Investment
Jubail II is expected to attract local and foreign investments worth $56 billion over the next two decades and generate some 55,000 job opportunities.
Dr Abdul Wahab Al Sadoun, head of the energy sector at the Saudi Arabian General Investment Authority (Sagia) which is spearheading investment into Saudi Arabia, comments: “Throughout the past three decades, the two cities of Jubail and Yanbu have not only succeeded in building and maintaining a modern infrastructure but, more importantly, have gained a worldwide reputation for developing and implementing environmental and safety standards that have become a global benchmark for industrial estates.”
Sagia’s investment strategy focuses on the key economic sectors that capitalize on Jubail’s strengths and investment competency in energy, transportation and knowledge-based industries. It also aims to encourage the transfer of knowledge, sharing of experience and exposure to international-level training. One of its objectives is to actively seek strategic partnerships for local players in the education and training sector to match capital with expertise.
The investment environment in Saudi Arabia continues to strengthen and Sagia is working with its sister ministries to drive it closer to conformity with international best practices.  In this process, the foreign investment law leads the legal framework for investor protection.
The investment and development sector of the RCJY is also improving the services and support to industries through the implementation of the ‘One stop shop’– which will provide continuous support to the investor, enabling him to find the information, documents, application forms and answers to all his or her enquiries.  Investors can invest in the residential as well as the commercial opportunities upcoming in Jubail II.
The investment sector is participating in studies to update the Jubail Industrial City master plan. These studies take into account future industrial, commercial and population growth over a five, 10 and 20-year timeframe, according to Sagia.
RCJY and Sagia are working together to make Jubail’s continued growth as productive as possible.
 
Jubail I
Jubail Industrial City is a Saudi Arabian industrial model that tells the story of planning combined with the will to achieve the comprehensive civic and industrial development seen today at all local, regional and international levels. The massive industrial complex situated on the Arabian Gulf, along with Yanbu, its twin on the Red Sea, stand as symbols of the Government’s vision for Saudi Arabia’s future development.
The city has just been named the Middle East City with the best economic potential by the leading business publication, Financial Times Business’ Foreign Direct Investment (fDi) Magazine.
Sagia submitted the full application for Jubail’s entry in the fDi Middle East Cities of the Future Awards.
Jubail received the accolade after its detailed economic information was assessed by a panel of expert judges who selected the city over 40 other economic centres in the Middle East. Among information considered by the panel of judges was the key fact that while overall GDP growth can vary sharply from year to year because of oil sector price fluctuations, the Jubail region’s private sector contribution to GDP had grown at a steady, average rate of almost 4 per cent per annum for the last 10 years, says Sagia.
Work on the industrial city began in 1977 at a small fishing village called Jubail, The entire infrastructure had to be developed, or imported in as huge, preassembled modules. The result was primary industries covering 80 sq km; secondary and support industries covering 16 sq km; a major harbour and port facility, including a 20-berth commercial pier; a national airport; public service utilities (water treatment, domestic and industrial sewage collection and treatment, and power distribution); seawater cooling facilities; roads, highways, and rail lines; telecommunications systems; a self-sufficient, full-service residential community, including housing, schools, a hospital, clinics, and mosques; and one of the world’s most advanced industrial training centres.
Jubail took project management to a grand scale. At its peak, the workforce reached 50,000. The city has enjoyed massive foreign investments totalling $46 billion to date, capturing almost 50 per cent of the country’s total investment. It is expected to rise even further on the map of global commerce and industry in the areas of energy and transportation.
Jubail is the world’s largest converter of natural gas resources to added-value petrochemicals, representing a 6 to 7 per cent share of the world petrochemical market, says Sagia. The city is now home to 17 major, primary industrial (natural-resource-based) facilities and approximately 150 secondary, support and light manufacturing operations.
Jubail’s rapid rise to world fame is continuing with numerous joint ventures being established in the City, joining existing major capital investment projects by Sina Petrochemical Company, Bassel International Petroleum Corporation, and the joint venture between the Canadian company Acetex and Saudi Arabia’s state-owned Tasnee Petrochemical Corporation, among others, in 2004.
There are almost 30 plants under construction in Jubail, with another two undergoing major expansions with another 44 on the drawing boards.
The RCJY has skillfully guided Jubail I towards sustainable economic development and has launched Jubail II with the same in-depth planning and incentives for investors that made Jubail I such a success.
Another dramatic change is in the city’s use of technology. The Royal Commission recently completed an information technology expansion, which brought broadband Internet access to most of the buildings in Jubail and added a new set of servers and other hardware. Jubail II will be high speed from the beginning.
Meanwhile, the construction of a new 1,065 km railway line linking Jubail with Jeddah via Dammam and Riyadh to form an East-West land bridge, combined with a longer line to link Jubail with the mineral-rich north, will elevate Jubail’s strategic importance even more.

Bechtel
Jubail Industrial City is one of Bechtel’s most remarkable achievements – a megaproject that has required vast resources and logistical planning on an unprecedented scale. Bechtel has managed the project since it began, and last year, the Royal Commission for Jubail and Yanbu asked the company to manage Jubail II.
For a number of Bechtel people, Jubail has become a home away from home. “Some of my staff have been with the job since the beginning,” says Mike Candler, Bechtel’s current Jubail program manager. “There are some long personal as well as professional relationships here.”
The industrial development required the world’s largest seawater cooling system, pumping more than 1 million cu m per hour.  The industrial plants, power sources, utilities, commercial ports, and national airport were only part of the job. Bechtel planned and managed the construction of everything that makes Jubail a community, including neighbourhoods with greenbelts, a hospital, schools, and mosques.
The sweltering coastal location served up challenges from the beginning. The work site, on the eastern shore of the Arabian Peninsula, had to be raised 2 m, and salt corrosion made equipment maintenance tricky. The multinational workforce, which reached a peak of 50,000, battled humidity and temperatures that sometimes topped 50 deg C.
Jubail has evolved into a major player in the global petrochemicals market, attracting top technical and business minds from 40 countries, says Bechtel. Its residents attend two dozen schools, shop at 14 shopping centres, and play golf at the Whispering Sands course.
One improvement over the early years is that today’s team will be able to hire more local contractors. “We have a much larger pool of experienced local contractors to rely on now,” says Candler. “We expect to build the project using almost entirely local help.”