Abu Dhabi: Brooge Petroleum and Gas Investment Company (BPGIC), a UAE company in the oil storage and services business, executed an initial lease agreement for new land in the port of Fujairah, near its existing facilities, which can accommodate its planned Phase III.

BPGIC intends to use the land to further increase its capacity for crude oil storage and services by developing additional capacity, and if needed, host the remaining 90 per cent of the refinery facilities contemplated under the refinery and services agreement and related agreements with Sahara Energy Resources DMCC.

BPGIC expects that Phase III alone could add storage and services capacity of 3.5 times, or 3.5 million m3, the size of BPGIC’s projected operations post-Phase II, which will be one million m3. BPGIC believes it could execute a final lease agreement, which would permit commencing plans and construction for this land sometime in 2019. Concurrently, BPGIC has had discussions with top global oil majors, which have expressed interest in securing portions of the capacity of a Phase III facility.

Paardenkooper, Chief Executive Officer, BPGIC, said, “We are very excited to be announcing our initial lease for significant land in the Port of Fujairah, which alone represents future capacity additions of over 3.5 times our facilities that are currently operating and under construction.”

Following the closing of the business combination, BPGIC will continue to be led by its current management team of Paardenkooper, Saleh Yammout as Chief Financial Officer, Lina Saheb as Chief Strategy Officer, and Faisal Al Selim as Chief Marketing Officer. BPGIC will remain headquartered in Fujairah.

BPGIC is developing terminals in phases and aims to have a total capacity of one million m3 following the scheduled completion of the second phase of construction by Q2-Q3 of 2020. If Phase III is completed successfully as planned, BPGIC would become the largest oil storage and services business in Fujairah, almost double that of its closest competitor.