North Sea Link Trenching Contract Awarded
Aberdeen based trenching solution provider Canyon Offshore Limited said it has been awarded a contract to provide offshore cable trenching services on the North Sea Link Interconnector linking the U.K. and Norway.
The project, which will establish a first direct connection between the two countries energy systems, is a joint venture between National Grid and Statnett SF, the Norwegian transmission system operator. The 1,400MW subsea HVDC system when complete will be the world’s longest submarine interconnector.
The multimillion dollar subcontract was awarded by Prysmian PowerLink S.r.l, who are manufacturing and installing the two parallel HVDC cables for National Grid and Statnett between Blyth in England and Kvilldal in Norway.
North Sea Link recently contracted cable suppliers Prysmian and Nexans to deliver the cable needed for the 740 kilometer route length. The converter stations in both U.K. and Norway will be delivered by power technology specialist ABB.
Prysmian will supply and install 950 km of submarine and land cables for the UK and Norwegian North Sea sections of the route. The cables will be produced at their Arco Felice factory in Naples and they will using their own cable laying vessel Giulio Verne.
Nexans will supply the fjord, tunnel and lake sections, as well as the onshore connection in Norway. It will design and manufacture some 500 km of HVDC cables at their Halden plant. The cables will be laid by Nexans’ own cable-laying vessel, C/S Nexans Skagerrak and protected on the seabed by trenching with Nexans’ Capjet system and rock dumping.
ABB will supply the high voltage direct current converter stations at the U.K. and Norwegian ends of the link. The contract to design, supply and commission the converter stations using their HVDC Light technology.
Estimated to cost €1.5-2 billion ($1.7-2.3 billion), North Sea Link is the first interconnector between the U.K. and Norway and will contribute to a more climate friendly energy system.
Canyon Offshore’s award will require the trenching of approximately 900km of the two interconnector HVDC cables which will have been laid onto the seabed by Prysmian PowerLink S.r.l. Management of the operations, which will be performed over four annual campaigns commencing in 2018, will be provided from Canyon Offshore Limited’s Aberdeen base.
Canyon Offshore Limited’s Director for Commercial & Sales, Euan Roberts, said, “We have successfully trenched hundreds of kilometers of interconnector cables around Europe in recent years, building upon our already established and successful oil and gas trenching market. This is our first contract with Prysmian.”
The link is expected to become operational by 2021.
February 2024
