Google's Tabua cable to be covered by extended Sydney protection zone

Google’s Tabua submarine cable will now land in a designated protection zone in Sydney’s south after the communications regulator agreed to expand the zone boundaries.

Tabua is one of two cables being built under Google’s Pacific Connect Initiative.

The company, through its carrier company Perch Infrastructure, said it wanted to land Tabua in Maroubra, outside the southern Sydney protection zone boundary, due to cable congestion within the zone.

It asked [pdf] the Australian Communications and Media Authority earlier this year to extend the zone.

While there was some opposition to the plan, notably from other coastal water users such as commercial fishing operators, the only telco to respond - Telstra - was in favour of the extension.

“Telstra supports this proposal as it enables the deployment of additional submarine cable infrastructure,” Telstra said.

“The enlarged Southern Sydney Protection Zone will also enhance the protection of the existing Southern Cross and Australia Japan cables as they will be located further from the southern boundary of this zone”.

ACMA formally extended the protection zone boundary on Tuesday, such that when completed, the Tabua cable will be the southernmost cable in the zone.

“This instrument extends the southern boundary line of the Southern Sydney Protection zone up to 4.1 km south, over the Tabua submarine cable,” ACMA said in a brief statement.

ACMA said it made “one minor change” that would allow the NSW government “to continue to use two fish aggregating devices at defined locations within the extended area of the protection zone”.

The actual installation of the cable in NSW still requires planning approval, a process that is underway.