The construction of the Sebou-Bouregreg basin interconnection project, known as the water highway, is underway in the Rabat-Casablanca zone. The infrastructure project is designed to address the region’s severe water deficit.
Spanning 67 kilometers, the project will link the Garde Sebou Dam with the Sidi Mohammed Ben Abdellah (SMBA) Dam on the Bouregreg River, according to a report from Morocco’s Press Agency (MAP).
The ongoing construction is focused on installing a large metal pipeline with a diameter of 3.20 meters, which will facilitate the transfer of water at a flow rate of 15 cubic meters per second.
Once operational, the water highway will allow the transfer of up to one million cubic meters of water daily to the SMBA Dam.
Since the first phase of the project began in September 2023, approximately 380 million cubic meters of water have been delivered to the SMBA Dam. The project’s goal is to manage an annual water volume ranging between 300 and 400 million cubic meters.
The ambitious project comes at a time when Morocco is facing six consecutive years of drought that have drastically reduced Morocco’s water reserves. The national dam filling rate has dropped to just 28%, with the SMBA Dam experiencing critically low water levels.
The Sebou-Bouregreg interconnection project is part of the National Drinking Water and Irrigation Supply Program (PNAEPI), which spans from 2020 to 2027 with a revised budget of 143 billion Moroccan Dirhams.