Deep tunnelling work for an underground oil storage cavern at Singapore's Jurong Island - estimated to cost $1 billion - is set to start soon. JTC Corporation has called a pre-qualifying tender for the first phase of the Jurong Rock Cavern (JRC) project. Trade and Industry Minister Lim Hng Kiang said that work will begin later this year, with the first caverns expected to be ready in 2009.
Phase 1 of the JRC will have the capacity to store about 9.2 million barrels of crude oil, condensates, naphtha and gas oil. Each cavern there will hold between 900,000 and two million barrels. Phase 2, adding a further or 10.8 million barrels, will proceed if there is additional demand. The caverns are near refineries like ExxonMobil and Singapore Refining Company on Jurong Island, as well as the petrochemical complexes of Petrochemical Corporation of Singapore (PCS) and ExxonMobil. Most of the companies have been approached to be users of the JRC.