12 November 2009 - French cable manufactuer Nexans has been awarded a EUR35m ($52m) turnkey contract by state-owned utility EDF to construct a submarine power cable for the French island of La Réunion in the Indian Ocean.
The cable link will take a subsea route along the coast to connect the power production facility located at Le Port in the West of the island to the capital city of Saint-Denis, which requires most of the power available.
By choosing this subsea cable route, the construction of 20 km of aerial power lines across a natural environment consisting of rugged, steep and mountainous terrain was avoided.
Nexans is manufacturing two 90 kV subsea XLPE cables, each 17.3 km in length, to provide a power link of around 100 MW. Each cable will include three phases with copper conductor cross-sections of 400 mm2, resulting in a weight of 60 kg per metre – a total of 2000 tonnes of cable.
Nexans is providing a complete turnkey service for EDF including design and manufacturing of the cable, as well as laying and protection. The cable will be delivered and installed at a water depth of up to 100 metres.
The La Réunion cables will be assembled in the specialized Nexans facility in Halden, Norway and will incorporate fibre optic monitoring and control elements supplied by the Rognan plant, in northern Norway.