Set of 100% green submarine cables to connect Norway and Canada
You thought everyone was already in the submarine cable game. But if so, you’ve counted the Vikings. (Never count the Vikings.)
The Leif Erikson cable system will stretch 4,200 kilometers between southern Norway and eastern Canada. One end will be in Goose Bay, in the Atlantic province of Newfoundland and Labrador.
This is a joint project between Bulk Fiber Networks, based in Oslo, and WFN Strategies, based in Sterling, Virginia.
The project is now in the feasibility stage, which will examine the hazards, risks, plan the stages of study and construction, and perform budget and economic modeling. This step will also examine the sustainability requirements for the cable supply chain.
Vikings go green
The two partners are looking in particular to promote their submarine cable as a highway to a Nordic hotbed of data centers powered by renewable energies. The system would be the first transatlantic fiber system fully powered by renewable energy at both ends.
All of this is in line with Oslo‘s 2018 national data center strategy, “Powered by Nature: Norway as a Data Center Nation,” which he updated in August 2021.
With a cold climate (hence less money and carbon emissions to keep servers cool), government support and competitive electricity costs, the Norwegian data center scene is growing rapidly and attracting big private sector investments.
The country’s grid is primarily powered by hydropower, although the country continues to be a major oil exporter. And growing the data center market is part of the Norwegian government‘s goal of doubling the country’s GDP growth by 2030 using AI and big data.
Sweden and Norway have both passed legislative changes to provide investors with tax breaks for pumping money into their data center markets.
Chicago-based private equity firm IPI Partners acquired DigiPlex in Norway in July, one of the region’s largest data center operators with facilities in Oslo, Stockholm and Copenhagen.
Also in July, the Israeli group Azrieli bought 100% of the Norwegian data center company Green Mountain for $ 850 million, from its former majority owner Smedvig and other shareholders.
Norwegian data center companies also came together in June to form an industry body, Norsk Datasenterindustri, comprising both these companies and the power companies Ringerikskraft and Statkraft.
Between the two partners, WFN Strategies will take care of the planning, design and high level plan of the project.
Bulk Infrastructure is a decent-sized player in fiber, and currently owns and operates over 10,000 kilometers of international and intra-Nordic submarine and terrestrial fiber networks. His inventory now includes four energized submarine fiber systems and one he is building.
And even in its early days, Leif Erikson’s system and its claims to renewable energy seem to impress the right people. The system has just received special recognition at the 2021 Global Carrier Awards.
In a thirsty data center world
In total, there are currently 1.2 million kilometers of submarine cables installed, enough to circle the Earth 30 times.
Although this is a lot, international data traffic crisscrossing the Atlantic will increase twenty-fold from 2021 to 2035, NEC predicts, making it one of the fastest growing routes for data traffic.
Light reading.
And more than 90% of international communications currently pass through optical cables.
They could have been days earlier with the announcement, which narrowly missed the Leif Erikson day – October 9.
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Pdraig Belton, Special Editor Contributor to Light Reading