Terna Completes Marine Works on Tyrrhenian Link East Branch
Italian transmission system operator Terna has completed the marine works on the eastern branch of the Tyrrhenian Link, with both 500 kV HVDC submarine cables now laid between Campania and Sicily.
The eastern branch consists of two 490 km submarine cables running between the Fiumetorto landing point at Termini Imerese (Palermo) and Torre Tuscia Magazzeno at Battipaglia (Salerno). The completed marine campaign required approximately 150 days of naval operations, with continuous monitoring of the route. The cables were installed at a maximum depth of 1,560 metres, making the eastern section the longest submarine connection ever built by Terna.
The submarine route will be tied into onshore infrastructure via underground cable: approximately 15 km in Campania, between Torre Tuscia Magazzeno and the converter station in Eboli (Salerno), and approximately 10 km in Sicily, between Fiumetorto and the converter station at Caracoli, in the municipality of Termini Imerese.
Cabling works on the eastern branch were carried out by Prysmian, which secured the original 2021 framework contract from Terna covering the design, supply, installation and testing of more than 1,500 km of cables for Terna's principal connections. The first cable was installed from May 2025 onwards using Prysmian's cable-laying vessel Leonardo da Vinci, while the second cable was laid by the Monna Lisa, working from Campania toward Sicily.
Four turnkey converter stations are being built across the wider Tyrrhenian Link project — at Eboli, Termini Imerese (Caracoli) and Selargius — under a contract awarded in March 2023 to a consortium of Siemens Energy and Fata, part of the Danieli Group.
The Tyrrhenian Link comprises two 500 kV HVDC connections rated at 1,000 MW each: the eastern branch between Campania and Sicily, and the western branch between Sicily and Sardinia. Total submarine route length is approximately 970 km, with a combined investment of around €3.7 billion. Laying of the first cable on the western branch, between Fiumetorto and Terra Mala (Cagliari), is being carried out by Nexans and reaches a record installation depth of 2,150 metres.
The eastern branch is one of three Terna projects included in the European REPowerEU programme, attracting €500 million in EU funding. The first pole of the eastern branch is scheduled to enter commercial service in 2026, with full commissioning of the wider Tyrrhenian Link expected in 2028.
