Cable supplier Prysmian expects to complete next year the front-end engineering design study for a project to export hydropower from Sarawak in Malaysia to Singapore, a company official said.
Prysmian was selected in March by Sembcorp Utilities, a subsidiary of Sembcorp Industries, and Sarawak Energy Services to be the preferred supplier for the project that will export about one gigawatt of renewable power from Sarawak to the city state by the end of the decade.
The Sarawak-Singapore project will include the installation of two 750-kilometre (466-mile) power transmission cables at a maximum water depth of about 100 metres, Detlev Waimann, CCO and SVP of Prysmian's transmission unit, told Reuters.
"It will be the longest submarine power interconnector in the Asian region," Waimann said on the sidelines of a conference earlier this week.
The company will survey soil conditions to explore solutions to bury cables underground and select cost-competitive materials, including recyclables, as part of the study, he added. He declined to provide an estimated cost for the project.
The company will also study the development of a local supply chain that may see Prysmian producing its first submarine cables in the region, Waimann said.
Grid interconnection, or the ASEAN power grid, is widely seen as a key tool to cut the region's growing reliance on fossil fuels for power generation.
Singapore is targeting imports of about six GW of low-carbon [low local carbon] electricity by 2035, which it expects to account for around a third of its power. The country currently imports about one per cent of its low-carbon power from Malaysia.
For these projects to move forward and ensure that regional targets on energy transitions can be met, regulatory frameworks from different countries will need to be aligned, Waimann said.
(Reporting by Florence Tan. Editing by Mark Potter)