To make wave power a viable energy source, large clusters of waveenergy converters should be deployed. For most of the farms the outputpower of the WECs should be aggregated in a marine substation andthen transmitted to the grid. The need for cost effective underwatercable connection operations is one of the main issues in offshoreoperations. Underwater connections can be conducted with wet- or drymateableconnectors, performed by divers or ROVs. Although there areexisting solutions used by the oil and gas industry that could beemployed, the capital expenditure needed is not compatible with theoffshore renewable energy industry.The objective of this research is to decrease costs and minimizeworking hazards associated with sub-sea work when performing theseunderwater electrical connections. This article presents a solution usingsmall ROV’s instead of divers to execute the task. The main idea is toperform the connection underwater, but using dry-mateable connectors.A solution to make this possible is to install air pockets at thesubstation enclosing the connectors. These boxes are meant to be filledwith air and hence create a dry environment in which to perform theconnections. This is achieved with help of two tools. First a dockingsystem allows the operator to fix the ROV at the substation beforedoing the connection. Then a gripper tool added to the ROV grasps thecable and connects it to the substation in the air pocket. The procedureand design of this low-cost solution are described, and the differentprototypes that have been tested for offshore operation are also shown.
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