Industry news22 Oct 202622 October 2026

Island Hopping, by Cable: Menorca's Third Link to Mallorca

Menorca has more solar panels than it needs on a summer afternoon, and still burns fuel to keep the lights on at night. A new cable aims to fix that.

Red Eléctrica, the Spanish grid operator, has chosen Nexans as preferred supplier for MA-ME 3, a third power link between Mallorca and Menorca. The agreement opens a six month engineering phase, the step before a full contract to make, lay and connect the cable. No price for the cable work has been disclosed.

On paper it is a modest project. In practice it is the latest move in a plan to turn the Balearics from four fuel dependent islands into one connected grid.

The link

The cable will run 82 km from a new substation at Alcúdia on Mallorca to a new one at Ciutadella on Menorca. Most of it, 64.5 km, sits on the seabed, at depths of up to 146 metres. It is an alternating current line at 132 kV, the workhorse choice for short island crossings.

🔌 Mallorca ⇄ Menorca: the new link

📍 Route: Alcúdia (Mallorca) to Ciutadella (Menorca)

📏 Total length: 82 km

🌊 Subsea section: 64.5 km

🛣️ Land sections: 13.7 km Mallorca · 3.8 km Menorca

⬇️ Maximum depth: 146 m

⚡ Technology: 132 kV alternating current

💶 Expected cost: €230 million

📅 Target date: 2030

Why Menorca needs it

Menorca already has 144 MW of solar capacity against a summer peak of about 120 MW. The problem is not supply at noon. It is everything else: evenings, winter, and the days when the single existing cable to Mallorca is down or full.

That gap is filled by the thermal power station at Maó. Red Eléctrica expects the new link to push Maó into a backup role, cutting Menorca's emissions by 154,000 tonnes of CO2 a year and saving the Balearic system about €36.3 million a year. A 50 MW battery at Mercadal, a €50 million investment, will help squeeze more power through both the old cable and the new one.

The lesson is a familiar one for islands. Adding solar is the easy part. Moving it, storing it and backing it up is where the money and the difficulty lie.

A grid built island by island

The Balearics have spent more than a decade wiring themselves together and to the mainland.

🗺️ The Balearic grid, link by link

1️⃣ Mainland ⇄ Mallorca (Rómulo)

📅 2012 · ⚡ ±250 kV direct current · 🔋 400 MW

📏 237 km · ⬇️ 1,485 m deep

2️⃣ Mallorca ⇄ Ibiza

📅 2016 · ⚡ 132 kV alternating current · 🔋 2 × 100 MW

📏 2 × 126 km · ⬇️ 800 m deep

3️⃣ Mallorca ⇄ Menorca

📅 2020 · ⚡ Alternating current

4️⃣ Mallorca ⇄ Menorca (MA-ME 3)

📅 2030 target · ⚡ 132 kV alternating current

📏 82 km · ⬇️ 146 m deep

5️⃣ Mainland ⇄ Mallorca (Pen-Bal 2)

📅 2030 target · ⚡ Direct current

📏 389.8 km · ⬇️ 1,613 m deep

The bigger bet

The Menorca cable is the small half of a larger plan. Pen-Bal 2, a second link to the mainland from Sagunto near Valencia, is budgeted at about €1 billion and will land at Alcúdia too. The two projects share the same corridor on Mallorca, which saves digging the island up twice.

Together, the two mainland links are expected to cover 65% of Balearic electricity demand. The wider island programme runs to more than €2.5 billion. At that point the islands stop being energy islands in any real sense. They become a peripheral node of the Spanish grid, with local plants kept for emergencies.

What it means for other islands

Malta knows the model well. Its first cable to Sicily changed how the island buys and uses power, and a second interconnector, 225 MW over 122 km, is due to enter service in early 2027. Nexans made the cable for that one too.

For ports, the arithmetic is direct. Shore power for cruise ships and ferries needs firm, cheap grid capacity at the quay. An island that still makes its electricity from imported fuel cannot offer either. An island plugged into a continental grid can.

The Balearics are not adding cables for the sake of it. They are buying the right to switch off their power stations.

DTF Maritime News