3/4/2022 – JDR Cable has been awarded a government grant for £1,606,711 for Accelerated development of Higher-voltage Export & Array cables for Dynamic applications (AHEAD).

A press release said that the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy issued a total of £31,600,000 in 11 grants related to innovative floating offshore windfarm technologies. The application from JDR Cable was related to array cable. Its entry noted that no dynamic cable rated above 66 kV has ever been deployed in an offshore wind environment, and that due to increased turbine sizes, distances from shore, and water depths, the industry would benefit from having significantly higher voltage dynamic cables.

The grant was issued to help JDR Cable achieve these goals: demonstration of innovative polymer insulation systems to be capable of operation above 66 kV and to 132 kV, potentially as a wet-design; extension of dynamic array cable construction to larger and heavily dynamic export cables at 132 kV; advanced dynamic cable modelling to engineer cable configurations with higher loadings or stiffer cabling; and integration of next generation optical fibre strain sensing technology into dynamic high-voltage export and array cables to improve offshore cable monitoring and maintenance.

The new cables will be developed at JDR’s Hartlepool facility and tested at ORE Catapult at Blyth. The project is also well aligned to the government-supported new JDR HV Cable Facility in Cambois, Northumberland, where project construction is planned for this summer.