Acciona strengthens its presence in Morocco with its first water contract

Acciona Agua, in consortium with the Moroccan construction group EMT, wins a 56 million euro contract for a drinking water treatment plant (DWTP) in the municipality of Oum Azza. The project will improve the water supply for the Rabat-Casablanca region.

Acciona Agua, in partnership with construction group EMT of Morocco, has been awarded a 56-million-euro contract to Design, Build, and Commission a drinking water treatment plant (DWTP) with a capacity of 5m3/second by Morocco’s Office National Electricity & Eau Potable (ONEE).

The project is part of an overall plan aimed at improving the fresh water supply along the Rabat-Casablanca coastline. The new DWTP will be located in the municipality of Oum Azza, some 30 kilometers from Morocco’s capital, Rabat. It is intended to improve the fresh water supply in an area with five million inhabitants and which has the country’s highest population growth.

Construction is expected to take 27 months to complete. The new water treatment plant will help meet the region’s water demand until the year 2030.

With the new DWTP, the Bouregreg complex, which delivers fresh water to the country’s Atlantic seaboard, will have a total production capacity of 14m3/second, making it one of the world’s biggest freshwater production centers. The Bouregreg complex project is being financed by the African Development Bank at a total cost of 250 million euros.

The Oum Azza plant is Acciona Agua’s first contract on Morocco, and the second major contract on the African continent. The Company was responsible for building a desalination plant in Fouka (Algiers) which became fully operational in late July 2012 and produces 120,000m3 of freshwater a day. The plant ensures the water supply for a population of half-a-million inhabitants in the Zeralda area and western Algiers.

This is also Acciona’s second contract in Morocco. In late September, the Company announced that it would build and commission one of Africa’s largest CSP plants, in the Sahara. The CSP complex is located near the city of Ouarzazate, on the edge of the Sahara Desert and in the foothills of the Atlas mountain range. This is a remote but excellent location that makes the most of the exceptional local solar and environmental conditions. The 160MW facility will require an investment of 500 million euros.