The Saudi Arabian Mining Company (Ma’aden) has awarded the consortium of Outotec and Larsen & Toubro with an engineering, procurement and construction contract to build a greenfield mineral concentrator and gold processing plant in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the Finland-based company says.

The order, worth some €140 million ($157 million) to Outotec, is almost evenly shared between the reporting segments and will be booked into Outotec’s June quarter 2019 order intake, the company said. The total value of the project is around €540 million.

Outotec’s delivery includes basic and detail engineering, procurement and delivery of process equipment, commissioning, start-up assistance and training services. The new gold processing plant is due to be completed in 2022, it said.

Ma’aden is a leader of the Saudi Arabia mining industry, and an internationally recognised mining company with a global presence, thanks to partnerships with the likes of Barrick Gold, Alcoa and the Mosaic Company.

The Mansourah & Massarah operation will be built in the Central Arabian gold region, with the processing plant capable of up to 4 Mt/y throughput. The concentrator and the gold processing plant has been designed to produce an average of 250,000 oz/y of gold per year over the life of mine, Outotec said.

Markku Teräsvasara, CEO of Outotec, said: “We are extremely pleased with this significant order and continued cooperation with Ma’aden that is growing to be a global mining company.

“Our previous deliveries have included grinding, flotation and filtering technologies as well as alumina calcination technology, and three sulphuric acid plants. Our proven technologies and services enable them to get the best value from their resources and build sustainable operations.”