NEWSROOM

When energy and utility networks have to be moved ahead of the construction of an urban metro line, finding space underground is definitely not easy. This was the scenario OPTIMUM engineers were faced with in 2023 when BIR commissioned the trenchless specialists to carry out feasibility studies and find potential drill paths for 2 cable installations southwest of Paris.

Great to have accompanied project owner AFR-IX over recent weeks during an HDD landfall construction for the Medusa project, which was successfully completed on Friday in Marseille, France. The 317-metre-long HDD, housing 4 x DN160 HDPE fibre optic cable ducts, will connect to the Medusa Submarine Cable System, a telecom corridor linking south European and north African countries.

Alongside Gendry as the town of La Grande Motte, on the French Mediterranean coast, advances with its innovative project to heat and cool the towns buildings using marine geothermal energy. The construction of 5 parallel 263-metre-long HDD landfalls was successfully completed last week to house 5 x DN200 HDPE ducts. Drilling through marly sands, the ducts pass under the promenade breakwater, to transport water from the system’s heat exchangers back to the sea.

Supporting project owner ENEDIS at year end for the successful completion of a 340-metre-long, fully curved, HDD to connect the newly built Fauvernay datacentre on the outskirts of Dijon. The drill path crossed clay / marl soils under the A39 motorway and the high-speed railway line between Dijon and the Swiss border. Limited access, a nearby road bridge, local housing and a 13-metre difference between the entry and exit points, called for close monitoring of drilling parameters and full-time onsite inspection.

BIR, on behalf of Orange, has successfully pulled a DN500 HDPE tube containing 15 fibre optic lines. The technical urgency of the project arose at the end of January 2020 as the need to divert a sensitive network installed in a precarious dam became apparent.