The Management of Information to Identify the Submarine Cable Route: the Case Study of Campania islands

Nonnis, O.; Maggi, C., Lanera, P.; Proietti, R.; Izzi, A.; Antonelli, P. and Gabellini, M., 2016. The management of information to identify the submarine cable route: the case study of Campania island. In: Vila-Concejo, A.; Bruce, E.; Kennedy, D.M., and McCarroll, R.J. (eds.), Proceedings of the 14th International Coastal Symposium (Sydney, Australia). Journal of Coastal Research, Special Issue, No. 75, pp. 1002 - 1006. Coconut Creek (Florida), ISSN 0749-0208.

Offshore pipelines and cables are infrastructures frequently located in the midst of delicate marine ecosystems. The route definition is one of the more complex and strategic aspect for the operation of laying a submarine cable or pipeline. In the designing phase different cable's routes are selected analyzing in detail the natural and/or anthropogenic constraints of the areas to be crossed, to identify the optimal alternative with less environmental impact. A multidisciplinary approach is needed to group all the area's and infrastructure's information, like bathymetry, regional geology, environmentally sensitive areas, shipwrecks, existing infrastructures, potential geohazards, geomorphology, meteocean observations and boundary information. Through an instrument named Desk Top Study (DTS), the information are analyzed and overlapped for the evaluation of the different route hypothesis and the design of appropriate survey programs. In this context TERNA S.p.A. (concessionaire company in Italy for the transmission and dispatching of electricity) charged ISPRA to perform the Desk Top Study for the connection between the coast of Campania peninsula and the islands of Capri and Ischia. Data relating to the areas affected by the electrical connections, collected through the DTS, were managed by a geographic information system (GIS), capable to organize different types of information, thus providing substantial support for the definition of the preliminary route. This work presents the methodology and the main results of the Desk Top Study, carried out for the electric cables laying between the coast of Campania peninsula and the islands of Capri and Ischia.