Five Oceans Services - Caymon North Sound Power Link

Projects : Power Cables : Caymon North Sound Power Link

In order to ensure that sufficient electric power is available on the the Grand Cayman Islands, a power cable link within the North Sound Bay was installed in 2001. ABB High Voltage Cable AB was awarded the supply and installation contract by Caribbean Utility Company. Five Oceans Services carried out the installation works of this turn key project within the required installation timeframe.
The installation comprised the installation of 2 High Voltage Alternating Current (HVAC) cables. Both cables were successfully installed in an average water depth of 3.5 m.

The total length of the cable route was 11 km. Water depths along the route varied between 1 and 6 meters.

Since the North sound is an environmentally very sensitive and shallow, a whole new approach to cable installation had to be applied.

A barge consisting out of 29 Flexifloat pontoons was engineered in the Netherlands and shipped to the Cayman’s.

Both cables had to be landed through mangrove swamp, which was successfully performed by floating 800m of cable utilizing Sea Serpent and pull the cable in by means of a shallow water tug and by hand in the very shallow area's.

Characteristics of the Cable:
Type of Cable	:	HVAC Cable
Total Length	:	22 km
Weight (in air)	:	48.5 kg/m
Outer Diameter	:	165 mm
Min. Bend. Rad.	:	3 m

In order to successfully complete the project, Five Oceans Services utilized specialized cable installation equipment including, but not limited to:

29 sections of Flexifloat pontoons
Shallow water tug "Zeus" (with a maximum draft of 0.6 m)
Sea Serpent floatation system