Undersea Jointing Challenges: Past, Present, and Future

Jointing is used in a wide variety of harsh environments ranging from coastal waters out to extreme deep water. A number of factors affect jointing product capabilities and features including: system types, cable types, regions of the world, geophysical issues, politics, and capabilities. While jointing has improved markedly in its long journey and is now quite mature and well-suited to perform the range of functions that systems demand, developers continue to advance jointing platforms and technologies in major ways. Nonetheless, in some instances the cost of establishing newer processes and technologies has not outweighed the benefits of continuing to use existing infrastructure. This paper explores both barriers to and opportunities for undersea jointing with respect to global market demands as well as the demands in regional markets—past, present, and future.