Dubai: Emaar Properties, developer of the $900 million Burj Dubai, has said the world's tallest tower will meet its scheduled completion dates despite continued delays to the exterior facade of the building.
The concrete structure remains exposed to the elements due mainly to the bankruptcy of Swiss-based curtain walling giant Schmidlin last year, the parent company of Schmidlin, which was contracted to install the tower's exterior materials.
Greg Sang, Emaar's assistant director of projects and the man overseeing the entire $20 billion Downtown Burj Dubai development, admitted that the tower was now "the tallest building in the world without glass", but said it will be completed by fourth quarter 2008, as originally scheduled.
"We've got extra workers on board and you'll see by the end of the year how it pans out," he told a meeting of the British Business Group yesterday.
The fact that the concrete structure is exposed to the elements in fact has no impact on its strength or durability, said Rod Stewart, regional managing director, Hyder Consulting Middle East, which acted as consultants on the project.
Accelerate work
Stewart also said it is possible for a contractor to accelerate cladding work to catch up with overall construction.
Earlier, Sang told Gulf News that the project is "a couple of months" behind schedule, but did not reveal details of the current work timetable at yesterday's meeting.
Revealing details of the exterior he said: "The cladding consists of 142,000 square metres, which is about 27 football pitches to be hung on the outside of the building. It's a unitised system so it can go in pretty fast."
"The facade looks like quite simple, with two panes of glass and aluminium framing, but it has to do a do. It has to structurally sustain the windload and cope with the building movements. It also has to keep the heat out, be air and water tight and be acoustically sound tight to keep out traffic noise."
He added that the glass exterior will be insulated, doubled glazed and coated with substances to increase reflectivity and limit condensation.
Sang remained tight-lipped on the final height of the building, but said it would be more than 700 metres. Work has reached 119 storeys and will rise to an unspecified figure above 160 floors.
The tower's occupied floors will be entirely made of concrete, while steel will be used to construct the very upper levels.
