No Solar Energy? No Problem! Gigantic Undersea Cable Will Make It Happen

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The Intertubes absolutely lit up earlier today, when the Australian government finally green-lighted the massive, long awaited Australia-Asia Power Link solar energy project. Under the purview of the startup SunCable, AAPowerLink will connect the nation’s vast solar resources to the energy-hungry island of Singapore by undersea cable. The private sector venture may seem quixotic at first glance, but the technology pieces are in place — it’s just a matter of next steps.

Solar Energy By (Very) Long Undersea Cable: Not A Dream

The idea of transporting solar energy by undersea cable is a relatively new twist on an old idea. The use of submarine cables for transporting renewable energy is commonplace, partly by virtue of the offshore wind industry.

Long undersea cables are also commonplace and they are getting longer, especially in the field of data transmission. The new Meta undersea cable project circumnavigating Africa, for example, is 45,000 kilometers (about 27,961 miles) long. “The deep-sea cable project will connect 32 other African countries and directly support economic development in Africa, fostering further growth of 4G and 5G and increased broadband penetration to millions of people and businesses across the continent,” Africa Business Insider reported last February.

By comparison, the undersea solar energy cable proposed by SunCable comes in at the modest scale of just 4,300 kilometers (about 2,671 miles).

On the other hand, power cables and fiber optic cables are not the same thing. As a power cable, the SunCable project is by far the most ambitious project of its kind. To date, the Danish-British Viking Link project is billed as the longest undersea power cable in the world with a total length of 765 kilometers (475 miles).

Technology aside, undersea cables often fall victim to damage, whether from passing anchors and fishing gear, deliberate sabotage, or collateral damage from geopolitical tensions. However, that has not stopped stakeholders from investing in new cable projects. Earlier this year, the firm MarketsandMarkets ran the numbers on submarine cables and reported that the undersea cable market is expected to reach $27 billion by 2029, up from $18.2 billion in 2024. The demand for power cables is driving the market, as well as the demand for fiber optic cables.

Australia To Share The Solar Energy Love With Singapore

As for the details, the SunCable AAPowerLink project surfaced on the CleanTechnica radar five years ago. In its current iteration, AAPowerLink will draw on the rich solar energy resources of Australia’s Northern Territory, with plans for constructing a vast solar array in the Barkly region.

The clean kilowatts will be shunted to Darwin by overhead transmission lines before heading out to Singapore by undersea cable on a 24/7 basis, with an assist from on-site energy storage systems.

SunCable notes that the 800-kilometer overhead line will “generally” follow an existing railway corridor, with the aim of reducing construction costs and mitigating environmental impacts.

“The project includes the development of the world’s biggest integrated renewable energy and battery storage facility in the heart of the Northern Territory which could over multiple stages have a capacity of up to 6GW of renewable energy to Darwin and Singapore,” SunCable adds.

That’s just for starters. SunCable is billing AAPowerLink as a flagship project, with more to come.

“We have a clear and ambitious vision: to harness Australia’s incredible renewable energy potential to power cities, drive new economies, and support communities throughout the Asia Pacific region,” SunCable explains.

In support of that goal, the company is laying plans for in-house cable manufacturing to ensure rapid production. SunCable anticipates that its manufacturing operation will be a “critical enabler of SunCable and other renewable transmission projects in Australia and beyond.”

Massive Solar Energy Project Gets The Edge On Nuclear Energy

Reuters was among the many news organizations to catch the latest news about AAPowerLink today. Reporter Renju Jose noted that the project is facing opposition from nuclear energy stakeholders, who argue that Australia can’t replace its coal power plants by 2050 without lifting a current ban on nuclear construction.

That is going to be a tough row to hoe. Unless the Commonwealth Government suddenly wakes up one day and decides to ban solar energy, AAPowerLink is on a faster track.

In a press release announcing the approval, SunCable noted that the project has now sailed through the Commonwealth EPBC Act as well as the Environment Protection Act of the Northern Territory, “paving the way for the next phase of development to deliver industrial-scale electricity to customers in Darwin and Singapore.”

Don’t hold your breath for all that solar energy to begin flowing. Although AAPowerLink has gotten past a years-long environmental review process, a Final Investment Decision is not expected until the beginning of 2027. If all goes according to plan, the solar energy will begin flowing in 2030.

In the meantime, SunCable lists the following steps to come, any one of which could complicate the timeline:

• Continuing negotiations of Indigenous Land Use Agreements (ILUAs) with Traditional Owners across the project footprint in the Northern Territory;

• Engaging with Singapore’s Energy Market Authority on the conditional approval application for the subsea cable interconnector component of the project; and

• Engaging with the Indonesian Government on regulatory and permitting matters to prove the subsea route inclusive of knowledge and hydrographic data-sharing.

What About The Energy Storage?

The newly issued approval for AAPowerLink represents quite a turnaround for SunCable. The firm was originally co-founded by Andrew Forrest of Fortescue Metals Group and the equally deep-pocketed Mike Cannon-Brooks of Atlassian. A battle royal later ensued and the company went into voluntary administration. Cannon-Brooks finally emerged with the company in hand last May, with an assist from his Grok Ventures firm and the net-zero specialist Quinbrook Infrastructure Partners.

While the ambitious mix of solar energy and undersea cable have generated much of the media buzz over the AAPowerLink project, energy storage is also going to be a key element in the project.

With that in mind, keep your eye on another Grok Ventures portfolio company, Antora Energy. The California startup is neck deep in the field of long duration energy storage innovation. The US Department of Energy defines long duration as 10 hours at bare minimum, far outdoing the current 4-6 hour capacity of conventional lithium-ion battery arrays. For grid storage and other industrial-scale users of wind or solar energy, such as the AAPowerLink project, the Energy Department has its eye on even longer durations lasting days, weeks, months, and whole seasons.

When CleanTechnica last checked into Antora, it was working with the Energy Department to refine its long duration “thermal battery” for commercial use, so stay tuned for more on that.

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Image: An undersea power cable will transport solar energy from sunny Australia to Singapore, helping the island nation transition to carbon-free electricity (courtesy of SunCable).