Life cycle assessment of high and extra high-voltage lines in Germany

The goal of the project is to obtain knowledge about the power grid infrastructure in Germany in order to ensure an environmentally sound grid expansion and to build up a sound knowledge base about the energy and material balance as well as other environmental impacts.

The following are described as concrete objectives:

• Identification of the elementary, currently widespread and future line technologies in Germany at extra-high level, thereby line materials, installation methods, bedding materials for underground cables and ancillary facilities for grid expansion on land and at sea, which are to be included in the study.
• Presentation of the energy and mass balance as well as the environmental impacts to be considered of extra-high and high-voltage lines of the power grid in Germany along their entire life cycle.
• Comparison of the environmental impacts of different cable technologies along their entire life cycle. Overhead line variants, underground cable variants and submarine cable variants with different materials for three-phase and direct current are examined, and underground cables and overhead lines are compared.
• Derivation of the need for environmental policy action and identification of optimization potentials.