NIA SSEN 0034 Submarine Cable Sensing (SUBsense)

Key Activities

The scope of the project is to install real-time monitoring systems on five submarine electricity cables in a variety of different locations interconnecting the Scottish Islands to monitor for third party intervention, cable movement and early fault detection. These cables will be monitored during the project and the data gathered will be assessed by the relevant teams. An evaluation will be completed at the end of the trial with recommendations of the system’s suitability for transfer to Business as Usual (BaU).

Expected Benefits

Install multiple Distributed Acoustic Sensing (DAS) systems onto fibre optic embedded in submarine electricity cables, providing real time monitoring.

Establish an effective communications method to enable real time alerts from remote islands to be received, investigated and actioned from asset management.

Document a baseline condition of the monitored submarine cables.

Monitor for an extended period to assess for alerts from third party intervention, cable movement or cable faults.

Gain an understanding of the system’s suitability as a condition monitoring tool for Business as Usual (BaU) adoption and its impact on asset management.

Create a specification for condition monitoring best practices to be used on submarine cables.

Progress

Five submarine cables were selected for trials, and two of these have monitoring systems installed. These are using both the DAS and Distributed Temperature Sensing (DTS) systems and are producing data. The project is continuing in Business as Usual (BaU), where this data will be used to inform further deployment of monitoring equipment.