Dutch DSO Enexis taps five new cable suppliers with €2.3bn tender

Enexis Netbeheer is scaling up from three to eight cable suppliers after a tender worth €2.3 billion ($2.5 billion) to reinforce and expand the power grid.

Over the next 12 years, Enexis intends to lay more than 76,000km of thick power cables in the ground to expand the electricity network in the Dutch provinces of Groningen, Drenthe, Overijssel, Brabant and Limburg.

Approximately 40,000km of medium-voltage cables and more than 36,000km of low-voltage cables are needed for the reinforcement and expansion of grids. To facilitate the operation, the DSO announced the tender, bringing in five new suppliers.

In a release, Enexis cites how network capacity in many areas continues to reach its limits, with significant groundwork needed to strengthen low-voltage networks.

The company’s three existing suppliers – Prysmian Netherlands, Twentsche Kabelfabriek and Waskönig+Walter Kabel-Werk – will continue to produce cables for the network operator as before.

Now, from the tender, a further five are coming on board: Tele-Fonika Kable, NKT A/S, Hellenic Cables, KLZ Vertriebs and GM Products.

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Commenting in a release was Enexis CEO Rutger van der Leeuw: “The task of expanding and reinforcing the network in such a short space of time is quite a challenge, but it would obviously be impossible without cables to lay in the trenches – everything would grind to a halt.

“We want to guarantee supply security of the requisite cables on a par with increasing volumes, which is why we are scaling up from three to eight suppliers. For the Enexis service area alone, we need a total cable length to take us around the world twice, as it were. We really are talking a staggering amount of cable.”

Added Judith Linssen, director of Procurement at Enexis Netbeheer: “We are very pleased to be continuing the relationship with our trusted suppliers and are very much looking forward to working with our five new cable partners. The expansion of our supplier pool not only guarantees future supply security, it will also enable us to make a positive impact on circularity together.”

Enexis adds that an important point of focus for the new suppliers is the reduction of virgin materials – materials that have never been used or applied before – in their aim to promote the circularity of materials used in cables, as well as of the manufacturing process itself.