High up in Morocco’s Atlas Mountains, water flows up and downhill on demand. When the wind farms and solar parks in the region produce more electricity than the grid can absorb, the Abdelmoumen pumped storage power plant pumps water 555 meters to an upper reservoir.

When electricity demand peaks, the water rushes back down through turbines, delivering up to 350 MW of clean power – enough to supply more than 250,000 people. “It’s our battery in the mountains,” explains Kamal Handizi, representative of the National Office of Electricity and Drinking Water (ONEE: The primary state utility responsible for electricity production, transmission, and distribution.) for the project. 

For Morocco, this is a strategic asset. By the end of 2025, renewables made up around 45% of the country’s energy mix, one of the highest shares in the Middle East and North Africa. “Abdelmoumen stabilizes the grid and makes it possible for us to increase the share of wind and solar in a sustainable way,” says Handizi.  

A BATTERY IN THE MOUNTAINS 

Abdelmoumen sits near Taroudant, about 70 kilometers northeast of Agadir. Built above an existing reservoir on the Issen River, it turns a familiar valley into a giant, rechargeable storage system. 

As owner’s representative, Handizi’s job is to keep the whole project on track. “My mission is to ensure that the plant is delivered as agreed – performance, compliance, and coordination between all partners,” he explains. That role began with selecting the right consortium. The VINCI/ANDRITZ team was chosen in 2018 in a two-stage international tender, with prequalification and a detailed evaluation of technical and commercial offers. “We looked at three things: compliance with the prequalification criteria, ability to meet our technical requirements, and competitiveness of the commercial offer,” adds Handizi. “VINCI and ANDRITZ proposed the lowest average cost per kilowatt-hour.” 

ANDRITZ’s scope of contract covers the entire “from water-to-wire” package: two 175 MW reversible pump-turbines and motor-generators, transformers, electrical balance of plant equipment, and automation systems. The waterway is a compact system of tunnels, shafts, and above-ground penstock, dropping 555 meters to the underground powerhouse. Together with VINCI, ANDRITZ delivered a 1.6-kilometer freestanding penstock, linked to 800 meters of tunnels, a 60-meter vertical shaft, and bifurcators that split the flow between units. 

The project faced real-world pressures: tough specifications, tricky geology, resource constraints, COVID-19, exceptional drought, and global inflation. “Despite these challenges, the teams always found solutions,” recalls Handizi. One standout moment was the manufacturing of the last penstock section in a temporary on-site workshop. “It symbolized the completion of very complex work and the joint effort around high-level know-how.”