The Mohammed VI Tower in Rabat was awarded the Prize for “Best performance in terms of engineering projects” during the “Caminos Madrid 2022”. This prestigious annual prize list, awarded by the College of Civil Engineers of Madrid, is considered a reference distinction in the world of construction.
During a ceremony at Matadero Madrid, the Prize was awarded to O Tower, a subsidiary of O Capital Group, chaired by Othman Benjelloun, contracting authority for the Mohammed VI Tower, and to Bernabeu Ingenieros, a design office responsible for the design of the structure.
With its slender structure, having required 13,000 tons of concrete for its foundations and 8,520 tons of metal framework, the Mohammed VI Tower stands today in the skyline of the Moroccan capital, carrying a signal of ambition and progress. for Morocco and Africa.
The designers and engineers endeavored to meet the requirements of its client. Faithful to an inspiration born in 1969 from an immersion in the heart of the training of NASA cosmonauts at the time of the launch of the Apollo 12 rocket, Othman Benjelloun is at the initiative of an original builder’s gesture, materialized by the emblematic shape of a rocket positioned on its launch pad.
Housing a mixed-use real estate program consisting of residential, hotel, office and service components, the Mohammed VI Tower has 55 floors for a total height of 250 meters. It is a key element in the development of the Bouregreg Valley and is, to date, the tallest building in Africa.
Its architectural approach aims to concentrate the main uses (offices, housing, hotels) on the north side, facing the Bouregreg river, the Hassan Tower and the recently built Grand Théâtre de Rabat.
To this end, the core of the vertical flows (elevators and stairs) is placed eccentrically, as are all the technical areas located on the south side of each floor, reinforcing the continuity and verticality of the tower. This configuration also made it possible to cover the south facade with photovoltaic panels, thus participating in the energy efficiency actions carried out by the project and aiming to obtain double LEED Gold and HQE certification.
The structural system adopted is a tube within a tube, consisting of an inner concrete core and an outer metal tube which, after several studies, has adopted a rigid tube configuration.
The floor slabs are made with a mixed structure, made up of radially arranged metal beams and a composite sheet slab.
High-rise buildings require robust structural configurations and complex construction systems, the Tour Mohammed VI also offers many remarkable features.
Its location in an earthquake zone thus imposed deep foundations, adapted to the geotechnical conditions, using diaphragm wall modules 65 m deep.
The eccentric layout of the core also required a very detailed analysis of the differential shortenings between the inner core and the outer tube, in some cases very close.
Finally, the tight control of the static and dynamic behavior against wind loads, required wind tunnel testing and various strategies, such as the incorporation of a tuned mass damper.
It is all of these challenges and the innovative solutions adopted that have led Spanish professionals to hail the performance of the Mohammed VI Tower in terms of design and engineering.
The construction site for this extraordinary building, piloted by O Tower, was carried out by a consortium of reference companies, within the BESIX-TGCC consortium. Responding to the wishes of its client, the best of international technology has, moreover, been confronted with the excellence of Moroccan ancestral know-how, artistic and artisanal for the design of interior spaces.