South Korea’s first specialized HVDC installation vessel to be built by Turkish shipyard

July 1, 2025, by Nadja Skopljak

South Korean subsea cable installation company LS Marine Solution has signed a contract with Türkiye’s Tersan Shipyard for the construction of its new, ultra-large cable laying vessel (CLV).

To expand orders for large-scale HVDC and offshore wind projects, both domestic and in Europe and North America, LS Marine Solution, as announced last month, is investing KRW 345.8 billion (approximately €221 million) in a CLV with a load capacity of 13,000 tons.

The agreement with Tersan Shipyard was officially signed on June 28 in Istanbul by the shipyard’s Chairman of the Board Nurettin Paksu and LS Marine Solution CEO Kim Byung-ok.

The vessel was designed by Norwegian Salt Ship Design and will be 148.4 meters long and 31 meters wide, offering accommodation for up to 100 personnel.

Capable of simultaneously laying HVDC submarine cables and fiber optic cables, the CLV will be one of the world’s top five in terms of cable loading capacity and the largest in Asia, as well as Korea’s only specialized HVDC installation vessel, according to LS Marine Solution.

Vessel construction is expected to take about three years, with operations scheduled to begin in 2028.

When announcing the investment, LS Marine Solution said the new installation vessel was being built to strengthen its technological capabilities in response to the West Coast HVDC Energy Highway, for which the new CLV is the only alternative among domestic vessels capable of long-distance, continuous cable laying.

West Coast HVDC Energy Highway is a large-scale grid connection project proposed to be built in South Korea by 2040 to transmit 20 GW of offshore wind, expected to be installed in the country by that time, to key industrial areas. If approved to go ahead, the construction of the project would start by 2030.