State-owned Kuwait Oil Tanker Co (KOTC) has signed with South Korea’s Daewoo Engineering and Construction a letter of intent to build four very large crude carriers for $700 million.

’The final contract will be signed on August 21,’ Nabil Bouresli told Reuters, adding delivery would be in end 2011 as part of a fleet renewal plan.

He said that the firm would also announce in mid-September the winner of a tender to build two tankers for petroleum products. ’I expect the cost to be from $180 million to $200 million,’ he said.

KOTC also wants to build another nine tankers as the third stage of the fleet renewal by next year, said Bouresli.

The firm already took delivery of nine oil tankers and a service ship, which were built in South Korea, Singapore and Bahrain, state news agency Kuna said last month.

The new tankers would replace ageing vessels as KOTC plans to have 28 tankers by 2015 and 34 tankers in 2020.

The additional ships complement the world’s seventh-largest oil exporter strategy to boost output to four million barrels per day by 2020.-Reuters