diff --git a/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/petsc/package.py b/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/petsc/package.py
index 61acffb77c..498a3723f9 100644
--- a/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/petsc/package.py
+++ b/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/petsc/package.py
@@ -139,6 +139,13 @@ class Petsc(Package, CudaPackage, ROCmPackage):
     )
     variant("cgns", default=False, description="Activates support for CGNS (only parallel)")
     variant("memkind", default=False, description="Activates support for Memkind")
+    variant(
+        "memalign",
+        default="none",
+        description="Specify alignment of allocated arrays",
+        values=("4", "8", "16", "32", "64", "none"),
+        multi=False,
+    )
     variant("p4est", default=False, description="Activates support for P4Est (only parallel)")
     variant("saws", default=False, description="Activates support for Saws")
     variant("libyaml", default=False, description="Activates support for YAML")
@@ -413,6 +420,10 @@ def configure_options(self):
         if "+knl" in spec:
             options.append("--with-avx-512-kernels")
             options.append("--with-memalign=64")
+        elif self.spec.variants["memalign"].value != "none":
+            alignement = self.spec.variants["memalign"].value
+            options.append(f"--with-memalign={alignement}")
+
         if "+X" in spec:
             options.append("--with-x=1")
         else:
diff --git a/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/tandem/package.py b/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/tandem/package.py
index bb294834db..7d1dd42a45 100644
--- a/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/tandem/package.py
+++ b/var/spack/repos/builtin/packages/tandem/package.py
@@ -43,9 +43,9 @@ class Tandem(CMakePackage):
     depends_on("libxsmm@1.17 +generator", when="+libxsmm target=x86_64:")
     depends_on("lua@5.3.2:5.4.4")
     depends_on("eigen@3.4.0")
+
     depends_on("zlib-api")
-    depends_on("zlib@1.2.8:1.2.13", when="^zlib")
-    depends_on("petsc@3.14.6:3.18.5 +int64 +mumps +scalapack")
+    depends_on("petsc@3.14.6:3.18.5 +int64 +mumps +scalapack memalign=32")
     depends_on("petsc@3.14.6:3.18.5 +int64 +mumps +scalapack +knl", when="target=skylake:")
     # see https://github.com/TEAR-ERC/tandem/issues/45
     conflicts("%intel")