Bahrain Oil and Gas Affairs Minister Abdulhussain bin Ali Mirza was quoted by Reuters as saying: "We have the refinery modernisation which will cost around $5bn.
Mirza said: "Already front-end engineering and design (FEED) has been awarded – FEED should be ready by the end of the first quarter of 2016.
"The increase in capacity according to the current plan is from 260,000 barrels per day to 360,000 and it will be commissioned by 2019.
"Financing will be through borrowing, we haven’t finalised this yet."
The expansion project is expected to increase the crude oil refining capacity of the refinery to 360,000 barrels per day from the existing 260,000 barrels per day.
The project involves construction of a hydrocracking unit with 60,000 barrels per day, expansion of the existing mild hydrocracking unit capacity from 54,000 barrels per day to 70,000 barrels per day, and replacing the fluid catalytic cracker (FCC) unit with a new one.
Mirza said that the pipeline work between Saudi Arabia and Bahrain is expected to be completed by 2018.
