Eiffage subsidiary in Franco/Italian power project

French contractor Eiffage, though its Gauthey subsidiary, is part of a consortium for a €500 million project to provide a new High Voltage Direct Current (HVDC) connection between France and Italy for French power company RTE, and Italian counterpart Terna Rete Italia.

The consortium is led by the Prysmian Group, which claims to be the world leader in the energy and telecom cable systems industry.

The underground HVDC cable project, known as the Piemonte-Savoia interconnection, is designed to play a strategic role in increasing the security of power supply and enabling energy exchange between Italy and France up to 1,200MW, as a new and important step towards the creation of a single European energy market.

The project comprises an underground cable system that includes the engineering, production and installation of two 600MW bipolar circuits along a 190km land route between the substations of Piossasco, near Turin, Italy, and Grand’Ile in Savoy, France, with a total of approximately 95km in each country.

Roda and CEBAT will provide civil works and installation on the Italian side, with Gauthey, Serpollet and Sobeca providing civil works and installation on the French side.

Construction work is due to start this month, and is expected to be completed in late 2019.