The job is to build a curved, compacted-concrete gravity dam with a crown 320 metres long. The dam will stand 132 metres high above its foundations and will have a water storage capacity of 910 cubic hectometres. The foundations for the body of the dam will lie about 25 metres beneath the current bed of the river.

The dam's construction will require more than two million cubic metres of excavation work and the use of more than 1.1 million cubic metres of concrete and 8.5 million kilograms of steel.

The FCC Group's different areas are well represented in Mexico. The contract for El Zapotillo Dam is just the newest addition to a portfolio including the Durango/Mazatlán and Ávila/Camacho sections of motorway and the construction of Aqueduct II, which will carry drinking water to the city of Querétaro and its environs. These recently awarded contracts are worth a joint total of 428 million euro.

FCC Construcción is also building Coatzalcoalcos Tunnel in the state of Veracruz, a job of tremendous technical complexity.