Switzerland: CERN reduces congestion in LHC tunnels

This year CERN extended its contract with the Prysmian Group to install and maintain he fibre infrastructure around its Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the world’s biggest particle accelerator. One of the key factors in CERN’s choice of partner is the flexibility and cost-effectiveness of Prysmian Group’s Draka JetNetXS microduct fibre blowing technology.

The LHC is located in a 3.5m diameter circular tunnel with a length of 27 kilometres, about 100 meters underground in France and Switzerland. The Draka- invented blowing system is an Innovative fibre cabling approach which allows for the miniaturization of the CERN fibre network by using smaller diameter cables in smaller microducts.

With JetNetXS blowing technology fibre can be blown through the ducts in the CERN tunnels up to 3.4 km at speeds of 100 m per minute. This proven technique allows rapid network expansion requiring new cables, or the replacement of old cables with radiation damage.