International certification and classification society, the RINA Group, has been awarded a contract with the Danish company Femern A/S for the verification of the railway interoperability and safety requirements of the Fehmarnbelt Fixed Link. That is an underwater tunnel that will link Germany and Denmark.
Through its size, scale and complexity it will be among the most ambitious infrastructure projects in the world, with the overall project value estimated around 5.5 billion Euros.
The Fehmarnbelt Fixed Link will be funded in part by the European Community in that it is considered among the priority projects of the TEN-T network (Trans-European Transport Network) and will consist of an 18-km underwater tunnel for the management of mixed traffic (road and rail), set to become the longest of its type in the world. The link, between the Danish city of Rodbyhavn and the German city of Puttgarden, will cross the strait between the island of Fehmarn (Germany) and the Lolland peninsula (Denmark).
As notified body for the 2008/57 Directive and independent safety assessor, through its Railway Certification Business Line and in collaboration with SINTEF (Norwegian notified body) RINA Group’s role in the project will be to provide CE verification services of rail interoperability of the infrastructure (civil works and permanent way), electrical systems and signalling equipment. Also in collaboration with SINTEF, RINA will verify the application of European Regulation 352 regarding the adoption of common safety methods in the rail sphere and risk evaluation (including also the verification of European safety requirements in railway tunnels).
RINA Group won a tender run by Femern A/S, which is responsible for designing and providing the basis for official approval of the coast-to-coast section of the Fehmarnbelt Fixed Link.
The agreement between the Danish and German Ministries of Transport for the development of the Fehmarnbelt Fixed Link was signed on 3 September 2008. It is foreseen that construction work will begin in summer 2015, with the objective of opening the tunnel to commercial traffic by the year 2021.
Once completed, the Fehmarnbelt Fixed Link will be the longest underwater tunnel of its type in the world for combined traffic (road and rail). It will be almost five times longer than the Øresund tunnel and around three times that of the Trans-Bay Tube Bart of San Francisco.
[mappress] Press Release, February 12, 2013