Zamil to supply 80 MHI chillers in record deal

SAUDI ARABIA: Zamil Central Air Conditioners has won a contract worth €88m to supply 80 MHI chillers to a district cooling project in Madinah.

The contract is for custom chiller systems for the Saudi Real Estate Development Company’s Dar Al-Hijrah project, owned by the Public Investment Fund of the Ministry of Finance, in Madinah, located in the western region of Saudi Arabia. 

Madinah, the second holy city in Islam, the first capital of the Islamic civilisation and the home and burial place of the prophet Mohammed, attracts around 10 million visitors a year. The Dar Al-Hijrah project comprises two towers including four- and five-star 120,000-capacity hotels with a total of 40,000 rooms. The towers will also house offices for 31,000 staff, with a nearby 400-bed hospital and a shopping mall.

Said to be the largest contract awarded to Zamil in its 40-year history, the 80 custom Mitsubishi Heavy Industries water-cooled centrifugal chillers will have a total cooling capacity of 200,000TR for use in the first phase of the project. The contract also includes chiller plant management systems, inverters, refrigerant pump systems and automatic tube cleaning systems for what is said to be one of the largest district cooling plants in the world. 

The duration of the contract is 12 months for the supply of the chillers and 15 years for maintenance and support. Tamil will begin supplying HVAC units in the fourth quarter of 2015, and will conclude the supply in the second quarter of 2016. 

Zamil signed a strategic supply, manufacturing and distribution agreement with Japanese manufacturer Mitsubishi Heavy Industries in 2012.