Western Link HVDC Cable Laying to Start Soon

The third deep water installation campaign of the Western Link HVDC cable will commence at the beginning of July, according to a Notice to Mariners issued on AWJ Marine’s website. 

The work will be carried out in the North Channel of the Irish Sea between Scotland and Northern Ireland for about 120km, and is expected to be completed in September 2016.

The laying operations work will be carried out by Prysmian using Giulio Verne cable laying vessel and the burial works will be completed with a plough by Deep Ocean 1 UK using Go Pegasus support vessel following the cable laying vessel at a short distance. At the completion of the campaign, a post-lay survey will be carried out along the cable route using the Go Pegasus vessel. The survey will consist of a visual and instrumental ROV survey of the installed Western Link cable.

The Western Link Project consists of installing two 600kV DC submarine cables in the Irish Sea from Ardneil (Scotland) to Wirral (England) for a total route length of about 387 km. The cables will usually be laid as two separate cables approximately 30 metres apart. The third campaign of about
120km is being installed from south to north.

National Grid and ScottishPower Transmission have come together in a joint venture to build the Western Link, a £1 billion project which will help to bring renewable energy from Scotland to homes and businesses in Wales and England. Construction of the Western Link is being carried out by a consortium of Siemens and Prysmian.