Bahrain and Saudi Arabia signed contracts there are worth $300 million for a new oil pipeline of 350,000 barrels per day between the countries, with the new pipeline to be functioning during 2018, said the Energy Minister of Bahrain on Thursday.

Bahrain relies on the output from the oil field Abu Safa that is shared with Saudi Arabia for the great majority of its oil and this new pipeline would replace on that is getting old and has less capacity per day.

Eventually the capacity of the new pipeline could be raised to over 400,000 bpd, said the minister during the signing event in the city of Manama.

Officials said the pipeline was scheduled to be completed between 2017 and 2018 and then a period of six months for trail runs would be completed.

Officials added that the oil pipeline would likely then be removed from service during the second six months of 2018.

Arabian Light crude is scheduled to flow from Aramco’s Abqaiq plant in Saudi via this pipeline of 115 kilometers, of which 73 kms is overland and the remainder under the Gulf.

Agreements for the construction of the pipeline were signed with the Al Robaya Holding Co of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates National Petroleum Construction Co.

The Saudi firm will complete the onshore engineering, procurement and construction or EPC work within Saudi as well as the procurement and engineering in Bahrain.

The UAE company will do the EPC contract for all of the work offshore.

A contract for the construction at Bahrain’s end of this new pipeline has still not been awarded according to a Bapco statement.

The overall cost of this new pipeline will be met by the investment vehicle nogaholding, which holds the gas and oil assets for the Bahraini government.

The new pipeline for a long time has been talked about. Originally, it was estimated it would be completed by 2016 but negotiations took too long.