The new Kipevu Oil Terminal at 63.2 per cent

The new Sh40 billion Kipevu Oil Terminal is now at 63.2 per cent, Kenya Ports Authority acting Managing Director Engineer Rashid Salim has said.

Salim said the construction works, which began on February 2019, were slightly slowed down when Covid-19 struck the country in March.

He said the project, which is being undertaken by the China Communications Construction Company (CCCC), has a timeline of 30 months and it is expected to be ready by August 1, 2021.

The project is fully funded by the KPA.

“We experienced some delays because of Covid-19; however, we are now back on track and we expect to finish the construction works within the period that was set,” said Salim.

In a phone interview with the Star, Salim said the construction works slowed down after materials became inadequate and some of the older staff had to go home.

He said they source some of their materials locally from Kilifi County.

“When Covid-19 struck, the quarries in Kilifi were shut down. We could not get enough materials. Some of the older engineers also has to stay at home because of the threat of the disease,” said Salim.

By December last year, just some eleven months since the project commenced, the contractors were moving at a good speed. The project was at 40 per cent.

However, from January to September this year, the project has only gone up by 23. 2 per cent.

The new Kipevu Oil Terminal is being constructed directly opposite the second container terminal at the port of Mombasa near Dongo Kundu.

It will replace the current 50-year-old terminal which is the first and the second container terminal.

It will have the capacity to handle four oil vessels of up to 100,000 tonnes and will have a Liquified Petroleum Gas line, according to the plans.

The Old Kipevu Oil Terminal can only handle one oil tanker.

The scope of the offshore works for the project include; construction of four berths, dredging, construction of sub-sea (submerged) pipelines for five different petroleum products.

These are crude oil, heavy fuel oil and three types of white oil products (DPK-aviation fuel, AGO-Diesel and PMS-Petrol).

For the onshore works, the contractor is expected to put up onshore pipeline across the container terminal, construction of beach valve station, pipeline assembly yard and setting up of material testing laboratory among others.

Dredging works were completed in November last year and marine pilling, which is the process of building deep foundations into the ground below sea level to support buildings and structures that are offshore started.