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Posted on 08/19/2025 12:24:54 PM PDT by Olog-hai
Work has begun to lay the underwater cable for the first electricity interconnector between Ireland and mainland Europe.
It marks a major milestone in the €1.6 billion ($1.9 billion) Celtic Interconnector project, which will link the electricity grids of Ireland and France to ensure security of power supply.
A specialist marine vessel Calypso, from Norway, has begun cable-laying along an 84-km (52-mile) section of the route.
Once fully installed, the entire 575-km (357-mile) interconnector will run from east Cork to the northwest of Brittany.
It will allow for the exchange of 700 MW of electricity, enough to power some 450,000 homes.
The high voltage direct current (HVDC) cable is being laid onto the seabed by the crew of the Calypso, with burial works done by two further vessels. …
(Excerpt) Read more at rte.ie ...
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Ireland already has two interconnectors with Wales in the UK. The UK has interconnectors with Norway and France as well. Everyone is scrambling to secure energy supplies as the net zero-inspired green wall approaches, and no one has any storage to speak of.
I thought they were going to build a bridge across the Irish Sea or chunnel under it. I could just picture Tristan cruising Isolde all the way to Cornwall as she and Brangäne grumped in the back seat.
Well AFAIK, “chunnel” is a portmanteau that means “channel tunnel”, and there have been WWII munitions dumped in the North Channel between Scotland and Ireland resulting in ruling out tunneling there. I’ve heard all sorts of plans for tunnels between the two islands, including one that joins the Isle of Man to both of them.
“A specialist marine vessel Calypso, from Norway, has begun cable-laying along an 84-km (52-mile) section of the route.”
Wasn’t Jacques Cousteau the former captain of that boat?
“The UK has interconnectors with Norway and France as well. “
Norway is the battery depending on the year Norway generates 90-99% of its electricity from hydroelectric power. They have very steep fjords and lots of snow and rain. They can and do ramp up and down gigawatts worth of hydro. This is exactly why there is HVDC links to Sweden, the UK, Denmark too. Norway is literally Europe’s battery. The beauty of the links is they are bidirectional so when there is wind howling in Scotland or Denmark two of the windiest places anywhere both having class 6+ wind fields those are 45% capacity factor area’s proven with actual turbine data anyone who has ever stood in coastal or northern Scotland knows exactly how bloody windy it is mate’s. Having links to Norway allows Norway to import cheap wind when its available while keeping water behind its many dams in storage offsetting what would have been hydropower flows. When the wind dies down Norway can within a few minutes bring gigawatts of hydro turbines on line and push power back.down the links out to Europe its like pumped hydro but no pumps needed gravity and the water cycle did it for you.
Ireland is also a 40% plus CF look at the spatial map red is class 5 or above class 5 is 40% CF deep.red is 6+ and 45+% CF. This is why Ireland is being brought into the European smart super grid. HVDC moves every 1000+km with single digit losses.
China is kicking the world’s butts with HVDC million volt 12,000 megawatt per link and million volt ultra high V AC lines too they have well over 30 links in action and more are coming from their solar fields in the Gobi desert and wind farms in the Tibetan plateau.
China added three Texas worth of solar in 8 months of 2025 simply kicking everyone else’s butts. Remember china don’t do climate change BS they correctly recognized that when the Sun shines solar in a desert is the cheapest form of energy humans have ever come up with period full stop the IEA has mountains of real.world data backing they up AI will retrieve and summarize it for luddites in seconds.
China is doing what Norway is they have the largest amount of hydro in the world and are in the process of constructing the single largest plant anywhere in the Tibetan plateau it will make Three Gorges look like a stock pond when that lake is filled behind it. All the big hydro power is linked via HVDC or UHVAC to the Chinese super grid those are the batteries in the hundreds of gigawatt range with thousands of gigawatt hours stored behind the dams.
Chuna recognizes that solar and wind are energy harvesting machines and in mountains and deserts there is virtually unlimited energy to be harvested it is a storage and transportation / distribution issue. They massively have storage and they have built out a super grid of million volt DC and AC transmission and distribution systems unparalleled in this planet. Everyone else is playing catch up at this point. The great leap forward was exactly that they leaped past the rest of the world because the one thing central planning is good at is massive infrastructure and build outs.
China is run by engineers and scientists not lawyers they win by that fact alone.
https://vortexfdc.com/resources/europe-wind-map-1km/
Or a diff ship by that name, yup.
Hmm, nope, two different ships.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RV_Calypso#Restoration_(1997%E2%80%93present)
Forgot the link to the world’s largest hydro project.
[Made up of five cascade hydropower stations with the capacity to produce 300 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity annually, equal to the amount of electricity consumed by Britain last year, the dam will be located in the lower reaches of the Yarlung Zangbo. A section of the river tumbles 2,000 metres (6,561 feet) in a span of 50km (31 miles), offering huge hydropower potential.]
One dam five more run of the river cascades the dam itself is 70,000 megawatts worth unparalleled anywhere. This is your energy storage all that water behind the dam is potential energy ready to be tasked when the Sun sets or the wind on the steppes and Tibetan plateau lull.
https://globalwindatlas.info/en/
For the class. Look at all the purple around and in Ireland , Scotland, Denmark,and Norway. Purple is 45% or more capacity factors. Then slide over to.China pay particular attention to just North of Nepal look at all that purple. China is going big with 10 and now 20 megawatt wind turbines. Wind scales at the cube root of velocity AND the square root of diameter. A 5 MW turbine pays back it’s entire energy budget to mine,cast, refine and deploy it in 6-8 months this is scientifically known as energy returned on initial energy invested. EROI or EROEI again AI will happily give mountains of actual scientific data for that fact. A 10 MW turbine is even better because of the scaling factors of diameter vs materials needed to increase diameters.
https://www.rivieramm.com/lead-stories-brand/first-chinese-10-mw-turbine-enters-into-operation-60228
China don’t do climate change they do energy harvesting machines that pay back massive captured energy once you built them. China is run by actual scientists and engineers who can do math and could care less about politics as long as it’s the party in charge. This fact means sh1t gets built and on a massive scale with 5 year plans made by engineers and scientists. Anyone who has never been to China and seen their modern monster cities cannot accurately comprehend how much they leaped. They don’t care about 600 million peasants they do care about the 500+ million middle class urbanites with that number growing every year as they allow more peasants to come to expanding cities and move up in class. I would suggest anyone doubting any of this before emotionally posting rubbish take a trip to Shanghai then get back to the class it will humble you quickly. Ride a bullet train to the capital Beijing be sure to get a Chinese version of uber in a BYD EV or plug in hybrid pay attention to the L2 charging ports at every condo, apartment and retail outlet parking deck. 400 volt triple phase at that not archaic 120/240V power in China is all 240V single phase and 400V triple phase Y wired so any single leg is 240V hot to ground and 400V hot to hot. Exactly how a modern grid should be wired not 1890s 120V and its bastardized 240v split phase monstrosity.
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