Havhingsten subsea cable system completed

News and Business

Aqua Comms, Bulk Fibre, Alcatel Submarine Networks (ASN) and Meta, have announced the completion the construction of the Havhingsten cable system, which runs across the Irish Sea from the north of Dublin, in the Republic of Ireland, to south of Blackpool on the west coast of the UK, with a section also linking into the Isle of Man, and from Seaton Sluice in Northumberland to Denmark.

The partners say the Havhingsten cable system boasts several innovations in its design and construction and is the world’s first aluminium conductor powered subsea cable system. The removal of traditional copper raw material, and replacement with aluminium from the manufacturing process, improves efficiency and cost reduction, as copper is associated with variable availability and higher price. Additional benefits include improved resistance to hydrogen penetration, an element which is unfavourable to the operation of optical fibre in ocean waters.

The end-to-end system also features an unrepeatered subsea segment in the Irish Sea, a terrestrial segment in the UK and a repeatered segment in the North Sea. Typical systems have one or two of these elements, but not all three. The system used an enhanced, jet-assisted burial plough in the North and Irish Sea segments, allowing installers to bury the cable to specific depths in very challenging seabed conditions.

Meta says, “Subsea cables are part of our continued efforts to invest in foundational infrastructure to keep up with demand for the internet now, and build for the metaverse in the future. We know bringing the metaverse to life will require major advances in underlying connectivity infrastructure.”

For more information, visit https://aquacomms.com