The Mediterranean has several decommissioned subsea cables and TIM’s Sparkle has decided to do something about it
TIM’s international wholesale provider Sparkle has signed an agreement with Hamburg-based Oceanic Environmental Cables (OEC) for the recovery and recycling of multiple unused subsea telecommunications cables. Under the agreement, OEC will acquire from Sparkle more than 22,000km of telegraph – yes, that old – coaxial and fibre optic subsea cables laid in the Mediterranean, generating an estimated saving of more than 35,000 tons of CO2e through secondary material manufacturing reuse.
Sparkle’s out-of-service submarine cables will be taken from the seabed and transported to the facilities of OEC and its partners, which will dismantle, separate, clean, and analyse the various components (optical fibre, copper, steel, aluminium, HDPE, and LDPE) until they are processed into high-quality “regranulates”. OEC will then return the materials to industrial use as secondary raw materials.
OEC is Europe’s first and only cable recovery and recycling company offering a sustainable and circular economy-based solution for out-of-service subsea cables. Thanks to a unique and patent-pending recycling methodology, OEC dismantles, separates and sorts all components of unused cables, repurposing or remanufacturing them back into the value chain, thus minimising waste and maximizing resource utilisation. The company claims to have developed a unique method of dismantling them with approximately 1% waste, ensuring all materials are upcycled and re-entered back into industrial use as secondary raw materials.
Turnkey service
The service is fully managed and turnkey. OEC takes over shore-end leases, permits & bonds thereby relieving owners of ongoing liabilities with a redundant system. The company will even remove shore-end manholes. The service includes desk top studies, permits and marine licences, environmental assessment reports, and cable recovery plans. OEC will clear out spares depots too including the removal of cables, UJ kits, branching units and repeaters.
With its own vessels and in-house designed recovery equipment, OEC said it is able to recover any submarine cable from any depth in any ocean or sea. The company can also perform Pre-Lay Grapnel Runs (PLGR) and other cable maintenance services like end-seal solutions. OEC vessels are also suitable for transporting new cable systems in case rip and replace is an option. The company said it has successfully recovered more than 25,000km of cable and have recently acquired more than 80,000km of out-of-service cables ranging from the Pacific to the Atlantic and the Mediterranean.
“We are proud to be among the first global operators to undertake such an innovative initiative, promoting circular economy practices and reducing environmental impact”, said Sparkle CEO Enrico Bagnasco (above, right). “The collaboration with OEC represents a concrete step toward a more sustainable future, where resources from the past can be recovered and transformed into opportunities for the present and the future.”
“We are thrilled to partner with Sparkle on this important initiative. By retrieving and recycling these redundant cables, we are not only reducing the congestion and waste on the Mediterranean seabed but also reducing the need for virgin materials in manufacturing. This process significantly lowers carbon emissions and embodies the principles of a circular economy’’, said OEC CEO Horst Brockmueller (above, left).
Crossing the Med
As of May 2023, the European Union had direct connections to the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region via 27 undersea cables. Since then several more have been announced. The two current choke points are the Strait of Gibraltar and Egypt. Over the past decades, the Mediterranean has seen numerous cables installed, retired, and replaced over the years due to technological advancements and changing data traffic demands.
In unrelated news, copper prices saw impressive gains in 2024, even breaking the $5 per pound mark in May (currently $4.35).