Shoaiba Power and Desalination Plant
Fuel oil-fired power station and desalination plant in Saudi Arabia. Largest fuel oil-fired power station in the world.
The Shoaiba power and desalination plant is an oil-fired, combined cycle gas turbine power and desalination complex in Saudi Arabia on the coast of Red Sea, about 120 kilometres (75 mi) south of Jeddah. It is one of the world's largest fossil fuel power plants, and the world's third largest integrated water and power plant.
History
In 1985, there was a power generation and saline desalination plant in operation at the site, with commissioning support from Stuttgart-based Fichtner Consulting Engineers. Construction of the first plant 1 of the Shoaiba power station began in 1985 and second plant 2 in 1995.
The ABB-led consortium built a power station equipped with three turbines, heat recovery steam generators and ancillary power generation equipment. The first stage cost about US$850 million.
The first unit came into operation in July 2001. The other two units were completed in August 2003. The contract for construction of the second stage was awarded to a consortium led by Alstom Power.
Desalination plant
A multi-stage flash distillation water desalination plant was built by Hanjung, now Doosan Heavy Industries, in partnership with Bechtel.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Shoaiba Power and Desalination Plant” is fuel oil-fired power station and desalination plant in Saudi Arabia. Largest fuel oil-fired power station in the world. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Shoaiba, Power and Desalination, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “fuel oil-fired power station and desalination plant in Saudi Arabia. Largest fuel oil-fired power station in the world” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Maps, plans, fabric surveys and administrative records can establish how the site’s name, extent and function changed over time. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 12, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7499716. Authority coordinates are 20.680, 39.523. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1985, 1995, 2001 and 2003.
Architectural summaries often privilege surviving fabric and can understate demolished phases, contested use or displaced communities. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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Three-step research path
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Questions for further research
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This entry incorporates text from “Shoaiba Power and Desalination Plant” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.