Located along one of the world’s busiest trade routes in the Straits of Malacca, the island will see an investment of RM700 million and become a hub for the petroleum industry in this region. The project will be carried out by Pristine Oil Capital Sdn Bhd and Siemens Malaysia Sdn Bhd and is scheduled to be completed in the second quarter of 2010.

Chief Minister Datuk Seri Mohd Ali Rustam said the project would be implemented as soon as the Environmental Impact Assessment by the Department of Environment (DoE) had been completed. “Once we get the green light from DoE, Pristine Oil Capital and Siemens will construct 25 petroleum storage tanks which can store some 250,000 tonnes of petrol on 32.37ha of reclaimed land.

“The seaport and independent oil storage facility is also the first of its kind in Asean and it can transfer the petrol to passing ships through a jetty,” Ali said after witnessing the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between Pristine Oil Capital, Siemens and the Malacca State Development Corporation (Malacca SEDC) at the Holiday Inn Malacca, here, yesterday. Pristine Oil Capital was represented by its chief executive officer, Kamarulzaman Mohamad, while Siemens was represented by its president, Tan Sri Rainer Althoff. Malacca SEDC was represented by its general manager, Zainal Abu. Ali said the Malacca Oil Storage Terminal (MOST) would be developed by Siemens using environmentally-friendly equipment from Germany to ensure the project did not harm the environment. Rainer said Siemens would also be providing the mechanical engineering and telecommunications system for MOST.