By Dan Swinhoe  Comment

Maple Leaf Fibre, a Canadian project to lay fiber cables between Kingston, Toronto, and Montréal, has dropped plans to lay a cable under Lake Ontario due to a shortage of cable ships.

Announced in 2018 as a joint venture between Metro Optic and Crosslake Fibre along with Utilities Kingston, was to have been terrestrial between Kingston, Ontario, and Montréal, and under Lake Ontario westwards from Kingston to Toronto.

However, a shortage of cable-laying vessels has led to a change of plans, with the whole cable system now due to be terrestrial, running from Toronto via Kingston to Montréal.

Fergus Innes, chief commercial officer of Toronto-based Crosslake, told Capacity: “Vessel availability [is] one of the reasons we have pivoted from a subsea design to a full terrestrial build on our Maple Leaf Fibre project.”

The companies were still planning as late as February to install the Toronto-Kingston section of the Maple Leaf Fibre on the bed of Lake Ontario. The project is already delayed, originally having been due for completion in 2019.

In 2019 Crosslake Fibre laid a cable between Toronto and New York. The cable ship C.S. IT Intrepid had to sail through St. Lawrence Seaway and a series of locks from the Atlantic Ocean to the lake.

The cable lands at Equinix TR2 at 45 Parliament Street and the 151 Front Street West carrier hotel in Toronto, running to Equinix NY4 in Secaucus, New Jersey with an interconnect in Buffalo, New York. It is currently the only cable running under Lake Ontario, and no other cables run under any of the other Great Lakes.

According to the ISCPC, there are around 60 cable ships in the world. According to SubTel Forum’s 2021/2022 Annual Industry Report, no new-build cable ships were delivered between 2004 and 2010 after a glut of investment around the turn of the millennium. Only five ships were delivered between 2011 and 2020.

The report notes that new ships aren’t being added at the same rate older ships are being retired. Only eight ships are younger than 18, with most between 20 and 30 years old. 19 are over 30 years old, and one is over 50.

In 2020 Orange subsidiary Orange Marine said it would build a new cable ship designed to help maintain both fiber and power cables, due for launch in 2023 to replace the 40-year old C/S Raymond Croze.

This year saw SBSS launch a new cable ship, CS Fu Tai. Built in Spain in 2007 as an offshore construction vessel, SBSS purchased cs Fu Tai in 2021 and converted her to a bespoke vessel.

South Africa’s Mertech Marine recently announced the retirement of cable retrieval ship MV Lida. It plans to replace the vessel, but hasn’t made any announcements yet.

Scientific community emerges as first party interested in Chile-Australia cable

The scientific and research community has expressed interest in the Humboldt submarine cable that will connect Chile to Australia and from there to Singapore, an important digital hub in Asia.

“The Humboldt cable is going to represent enormous growth in terms of the links and capabilities of the region to cooperate and develop joint research capabilities with research and education networks located in Asia,” Executive director of Latin American academic network RedClara, Luis Cadenas said during a webinar organized by regional development bank CAF.

RedClara, an organization formed by 13 countries in the region and which consumed some 4,520TB of data in 2018, has been mentioned as one of the potential clients in the feasibility and synergy studies on the new submarine cable.

Through strategic partner H2 Cable talks are beginning with scientific networks in Australia, Singapore and New Zealand, Natalia López, manager of digital projects of Chile’s state-run infrastructure fund Desarrollo País, said during the same webinar.

Asked about the effect of the arrival of new submarine routes such as Humboldt or EllaLink in the region, Cadenas said “the impact is very great because the scientific community at the Latin American level has an increasing need to handle large amounts of data.”

Cadenas referred especially to the large volumes of information handled by the astronomical observatories located in Chile.

Chilean telecommunications undersecretary Claudio Araya said that one of the recommendations of the feasibility and synergy studies for the Humboldt cable is to assess the possibility of extending the submarine infrastructure to Antarctica.

The country has already announced a feasibility study on connecting Antarctica. Meanwhile, Silica Networks – which also has a relationship with the academic community since it connects one of the Chilean observatories – is also conducting its own study to lay a submarine cable to Antarctica.

Studies are also underway to connect the new subsea infrastructure with existing routes to Africa and Europe to create a transoceanic corridor.

In addition to the scientific community, Desarrollo País aims to add clients such as global content providers, regional telecommunications companies, ISPs and private sector IT companies.

Desarrollo País recently confirmed that it is still in the process of validating the economic viability of the transpacific Humboldt cable.

“We don’t expect to lay a cable that’s useless” said López.

By the end of this year, Chile hopes to have a clear financial model for the Humboldt cable and a completed presale process. It is also expected to close the contract to build the cable. At the same time, work is being done on the final design of the route.

Investments of US$650mn were initially mentioned, but the current estimate is that the line would cost around US$450mn. The costs will eventually be established based on the request for proposals (RFP).

The Humboldt cable is expected to capture about 18 per cent of the traffic between South America and Asia. Initial studies indicate that traffic between the two regions is expected to grow by around 28 per cent per year over the next 25 years.

International Cooperation

Argentina ratified its interest in participating in the trans-Pacific connectivity project in April 2022. Argentina and Chile are now holding bilateral meetings to define the participation of Argentine state company Arsat in the project.

Chile also has been holding advanced talks with Brazil over the cable and negotiations are being conducted with Uruguay to join the project.

Meanwhile, landlocked nations Bolivia and Paraguay would also benefit significantly from direct connection to the Humboldt submarine cable and López mentioned that “we’re resuming talks with Bolivia and Paraguay.”