By CUI HAIPEI at Burgan Oil Field, Kuwait |
China Daily |
Updated: 2026-05-27 10:25
Specialized vehicles churn contaminated soil at a remediation site in Kuwait, while sprinklers spray water infused with petroleum-degrading bacteria. CUI HAIPEI / CHINA DAILY
After a rare winter rain, patches of green have sprouted along the roadsides at Kuwait’s vast onshore Burgan field, the second-largest oilfield in the world. The sight might seem unremarkable — just another sign of life returning to the desert after rains — but beneath this seemingly ordinary renewal lies an extraordinary story of technological triumph over one of history’s greatest environmental catastrophes.
For Kuwaitis, these fragile patches of green are far more than seasonal regrowth. They are symbols of hope — tangible proof that land poisoned by war can be healed. Since 2021, a soil rehabilitation project has quietly reversed the scars left by the worst oil spill in human memory.
The damage was done more than three decades ago. During the Gulf War in 1991, retreating Iraqi forces torched nearly 650 Kuwaiti oil wells, turning the desert sky black.
An international coalition of 16,000 firefighters battled the fires for nearly nine months until the last well was finally capped on Nov 6, 1991, but the crude that gushed forth and pooled in the sand remained. Hundreds of toxic “oil lakes” lingered, poisoning groundwater and transforming vast swaths of desert into toxic asphalt flats.
“For nearly 10 months, everything in Kuwait was turned upside down,” Mohammad Mubarak Al-Qahtani, head of the environmental remediation program at Kuwait Oil Company, or KOC, said.
“Daylight was obscured by thick smoke, and nights were lit up by the distant glow of burning oil wells. A third of Kuwait’s territory was polluted, and its ecosystem was devastated. Birds avoided Kuwait entirely, migrating elsewhere. Pollutants even drifted as far as the Himalayas,” he said.
Khaled A. Al-Haid, a senior engineer at KOC, was 13 years old at the time. He still remembers being “terrified to see an ocean of crude everywhere”. “I asked my uncle: ‘You can pump out the oil, but what do you do with the soil?’”
His question went unanswered until late 2019, when Kuwait decided to seek a global solution.
The tender attracted global bidders. Among them was Hangzhou Zaopin ST Co Ltd, an environmental startup from China. Though it had no prior overseas experience, it had a key advantage: proprietary microbial remediation technology honed over a decade of research and supported by partnerships with China’s top universities.
“We came to Kuwait with confidence — not in our brand, but in our expertise,” said Dai Baiping, founder and CEO of Zaopin, recalling the 2021 bid victory. “It was our first major international project, and it felt like the moment our technology had been waiting for.”
Inside Burgan today, Chinese technology is on full display.
At one operation site, rows of contaminated black soil — nearly 470,000 metric tons — are spread across a treatment area. Specialized vehicles churn the soil, while sprinklers spray water infused with petroleum-degrading bacteria. In just three months, the oil content in this soil drops from 5 percent to below 1 percent — clean enough to meet Kuwait’s environmental standards.
“We succeeded in identifying and cultivating microbes from more than 2,000 bacterial strains collected from Kuwait’s oil sludge,” Dai said at Zaopin’s laboratory in Kuwait City. “We then bioengineered them into highly efficient ‘oil-eaters’.”
Using this method, the company has already treated over 5 million tons of contaminated soil in Kuwait.
A technician from China’s Hangzhou Zaopin ST Co Ltd checks the cleaned-up soil. CUI HAIPEI / CHINA DAILY
Microbes are not the only tool in the toolbox.
For heavily contaminated soil with oil content exceeding 5 percent, Zaopin deployed a second method: soil washing. Using heat, chemical agents and mechanical separation, the process strips crude from the sand and recovers it for reuse — transforming the blackened soil into a resource suitable for planting.
Mohammad Khalaf, a senior KOC engineer at the site, admitted he was skeptical when the project launched in 2021.
“To be honest, I didn’t believe the Chinese soil washing method would work,” he said.
“But they overcame every technical challenge and delivered certified results. Now I don’t just trust them 100 percent — I trust them 110 percent.”
Ahmed El-Sherif, COO of Heisco — a Kuwaiti industrial firm that brought Zaopin to the Middle East — noted that the Chinese company’s annual R&D investment has enabled it to master core soil remediation technologies, establish a strong industry presence and deliver greater value to its partners.
“The technologies of Chinese companies have truly impressed us all,” he said.
The numbers speak for themselves. In December, the consortium overseeing the southern Burgan rehabilitation project set a record: 3 million tons of treated soil and 150,000 barrels of recovered crude oil.
Meanwhile, other Chinese companies are joining the effort. Jereh Group, a Chinese oilfield services and equipment manufacturer, recently passed performance tests for a pyrolysis system designed to treat the most heavily contaminated sludge from the oil lakes — while recovering high-quality crude in the process.
Yu Yang, Jereh’s Kuwait country manager for marketing, said the equipment heats sludge to 300-600 C, effectively processing viscous deposits in oil lakes and recovering crude oil via the company’s self-developed, full-process oil sludge treatment technology.
A painting depicting hopes for ecological revival is seen on the wall of the Kuwait Oil Company camp. CUI HAIPEI / CHINA DAILY
The impact is no longer just industrial. It is ecological.
Back at Zaopin’s site, the third-generation soil washing equipment will go online in the near future. Its capacity will nearly double to 1,300 tons per day, while microbial treatment cycles are expected to shrink from three months to two months.
“We’re not just fixing soil,” said Dai. “We’re helping bring back a desert ecosystem that was written off as lost.”
Global impact
Kuwait is the world’s eighth-largest oil exporter and 10th-largest oil producer, and its crude and refined oil shipments account for 95 percent of its total exports.
Along with other Gulf nations, Kuwait has been severely impacted by the conflict involving the United States, Israel, and Iran since Feb 28, with crude output sliding sharply in March and April, according to OPEC’s April monthly report.
Oil production has been scaled back amid limited export access via the Strait of Hormuz due to regional tensions. Tanker traffic along the vital waterway linking the Gulf to global energy markets has dropped markedly.
As oil flow disruptions filled storage facilities across the region, producers also opted for voluntary output cuts to avoid rapid saturation.
OPEC data showed Kuwait’s crude production tumbled 53 percent month-on-month in March. The country pumped around 2.6 million barrels per day in February.
Furthermore, the country recorded zero crude oil exports in April, according to monitoring group TankerTrackers. In a post on X, it noted this marked the first time a major Gulf oil producer posted no monthly oil shipments since the end of the 1991 Gulf War.
While less catastrophic than the environmental fallout of the 1991 Gulf War, the regional conflict once again threatens the Gulf’s fragile ecosystem. Authorities have dealt with fires at oil facilities targeted in attacks, including Ras Tanura in Saudi Arabia, Ruwais in Abu Dhabi, and Salalah in Oman.
In March, the United Nations Environment Programme warned that the conflict had triggered far-reaching ecological damage. Christian Lindmeier, spokesman for the World Health Organization, also cautioned that the “black rain” over Tehran following US and Israeli strikes poses serious health risks to residents.
The ripple effects extend beyond the Middle East.
Disrupted Gulf oil exports may force some countries to turn to more polluting energy sources such as coal to offset supply shortages. Meanwhile, longer shipping routes and aviation diversions have increased fuel consumption, bringing broader global environmental impacts, noted a March 16 editorial in the Abu Dhabi-based newspaper The National.
Even amid the energy downturn and regional uncertainty, social order in Kuwait has gradually returned to normal. People and families have resumed daily routines and maintained steady productivity, showing quiet resilience rather than widespread disruption.
In a message to China Daily in May, Zaopin said all Chinese technicians have returned to the site.
Due to the conflict, the facility scaled back from round-the-clock operations to daytime-only shifts, and the resumption of night work will be decided later by Kuwait’s Ministry of Oil and senior KOC management.
Kuwaiti society has demonstrated its resilience, said Yaqoub Al-Kandari, acting director of the Gulf and Arabian Peninsula Center at Kuwait University.
“This ability did not emerge only from the recent crisis, but extends across historical hardships from pre-oil era difficulties to the 1990 Iraqi invasion and the COVID-19 pandemic.”
