Saudi Arabia will soon become a competition for Dubai, as Dubai has been the long champion of all things biggest, longest and most expensive, reports CNN.
According to Construction Weekly, if Saudi Arabia succeds in its plans to construct the even larger Kingdom Tower in Jeddah, a prospect looking more likely as works begins next week. Dubai's iconic Burj Khalifa currently the world's tallest building could be stripped of its Guinness title.
It is expected construction of the tower will require 5.7 million square-feet of concrete and 80,000 tons of steel.
Consultants at Advanced Construction Technology Services (ACTS) have recently announced testing the materials to build the 3,280-feet (one kilometre) skyscraper.
The Burj Khalifa in comparison stands at a meeker 2,716-feet, or 827 metres.
According to the Saudi Gazette, building the Kingdom Tower will require about 5.7 million square-feet of concrete, and 80,000 tons of steel.
The construction of the tower is estimated to cost $1.23 billion which would have 200 floors and overlook the Red Sea.
Since building a structure that tall, particularly on the coast where salt water could potentially damage it is no easy task. The foundations, which will be 200 feet (60 metres) deep, will need to be able to withstand the saltwater of the nearby ocean. As a result, ACTS will test the strength of different concretes.
To counter the challenge of wind load being another factor for buildings of this magnitude, the tower will change shape regularly.
Gordon Gill a partner at Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture,the design architects for the project explained to Construction Weekly saying, because it changes shape every few floors, the wind loads go round the building and won't be as extreme as on a really solid block.
Delivering the concrete to higher floors will also be a challenge. Possibly, engineers could use similar methods to those employed when building the Burj Khalifa; six million cubic feet of concrete were pushed through a single pump, usually at night to ensure the temperatures were low enough to ensure it would set.
“Though ambitious, building the Kingdom Tower should be feasible,” said Dr Sang Dae Kim, the director of the Council on Tall Buildings.
He told Construction Weekly at this point in time we can build a tower that is one kilometre, maybe two kilometres. Any higher than that and we will have to do a lot of homework.
