Laying of Block Island Mainland Link to Start This Week

The Big Max cable laying barge will start installing the 20-mile submarine cable which will export the electricity produced by the the first US offshore wind farm, the 30MW Block Island, to the mainland later this week.

The National Grid (Sea2Shore) subsea cable will connect Block Island, to Naragansett, Rhode Island.

The installation works will begin at Scarborough Beach, where the Big Max and associated support vessels will be positioned off the shore of Scarborough Beach for a couple of days while the submarine cable is fed through the conduit and into the land/sea transition vault.

Once the cable is secured in the vault, the barge will begin the approximate two week, 20-mile journey to Block Island, burying the cable roughly 4-6 feet below the sea floor.

The Horizontal Directional Drilling (HDD) operation was completed at Scarborough Beach ahead of the installation works, and all associated equipment is in the process of demobilization.

Crews also completed the installation of the land/sea transition vault where the submarine and land cables will connect in the Scarborough Beach parking lot. Restoration and other connection efforts will continue in the vicinity.

All of the manholes and duct bank, with the exception of the duct bank immediately in front of the Wakefield substation, have been installed and crews will be pulling wire underground along the route for the next few weeks, with the work expected to conclude for the season on 24 June.

The Big Max started laying the 8-mile subsea link between the wind farm and the substation on Block Island in early May. The works were completed on 27 May.