Skip to main content

Fehmarn Belt Fixed Link could open by 2025 at earliest

The ambitious Fehmarn Belt Fixed Link, connecting Denmark and Germany, will open in 2025 at the earliest, according to the Danish finance ministry. Femern A/S, the Danish government-owned company managing the project, confirmed the note from the government. It also said the ministry still has financial concerns over the deal to build an immersed tunnel connecting the towns of Rødby in Denmark’s southern Zealand with Puttgarden in northern Germany. Of particular is the time for a construction company t
November 27, 2015 Read time: 3 mins
The ambitious Fehmarn Belt Fixed Link, connecting Denmark and Germany, will open in 2025 at the earliest, according to the Danish finance ministry.

4782 Femern A/S, the Danish government-owned company managing the project, confirmed the note from the government. It also said the ministry still has financial concerns over the deal to build an immersed tunnel connecting the towns of Rødby in Denmark’s southern Zealand with Puttgarden in northern Germany.

Of particular is the time for a construction company to receive full payback for the project because of declining traffic volume forecasts.

Financing includes European Union subsidies amounting to nearly €590 million during 2016-2019, but with delays to start of construction subsidies may be cut back.

World Highways reported in October that a study by Danish consultant Hans Schjær-Jacobsen had shown that payback period for the proposed 17km tunnel would be close to 50 years. This is a decade longer than estimated by the developers of the project, the study noted.

The Fehmarn Belt Fixed Link will connect the German island of Fehmarn with the Danish island of Lolland. The tunnel, incorporating two railway tunnels, two motorway tunnels and an emergency tunnel, will cross the Fehmarn Belt, or Fehmarn Strait, in the Baltic Sea.

According to the study, driver fees alone are unlikely to be sufficient for the financing of the link. Danish taxpayers will likely have to contribute to the project. More research is needed to pinpoint the finer details of the project whose estimated cost has been rising over the past year.

The Fehmarn Belt immersed tunnel project was approved by the Danish parliament in April this year. It is supposed to be built, owned - apart from the German land works - and operated by a Danish state agency called Femern, a subsidiary of Sund & Bælt Holding, and financed by loans guaranteed by the Danish government.

World Highways also reported in February that the Danish government was talking to contractors over the latest rise, a jump of €1.2 billion, in cost estimates for entire project. Contractors estimated an extra €295.5 million will be needed.

This is in addition to a statement in November 2014 by the contracting company Femern saying that costs had risen nearly by €900 million.

For more information on companies in this article

Related Content

  • New Penang Bridge takes shape
    May 9, 2012
    Construction work on the longest bridge in Malaysia and South-East Asia is well underway. Malaysia and South-East Asia is well underway. When completed, the cable-stayed bridge will have a two-lane carriageway and a motorcycle lane in each direction, and will connect Batu Kawan on the mainland to Seberang Perai and Batu Maung on Penang Island. The main span will be 250m long with a length over water of 17km and a 30m height above the water. Costing an estimated US$1.5 billion the 24km long bridge is being b
  • Volvo CE’s arduous Andes assignment
    August 20, 2013
    Volvo Construction Equipment is working in some of the world’s most treacherous terrain to construct a high-speed road link across the Andes Mountains. A fleet of 60 Volvo Construction Equipment (Volvo CE) road-building machines is being used to construct a 140km highway across the Andes Mountains, from Bucaramanga, Colombia’s eighth largest city, to Cucuta on the border – providing the country with a much-needed high-speed link with Venezuela. Tasked with this huge undertaking is innovative Colombian hi
  • Russia one of Europe “growth engines” for construction equipment
    June 4, 2013
    Russia is one of the “growth engines” for the European construction equipment industry, says Ralf Wezel, secretary general of CECE, the European Construction Equipment Association. According to the CECE, one out of three tower cranes produced and sold in Europe are currently going to Russia. The Association says that Russian governmental and private projects in the oil and gas industry and in the infrastructure and housing sectors are stimulating demand, with building hoists, truck mixers, concrete batching
  • Indonesian toll roads
    August 13, 2012
    ijaya Karya (Wika), the Indonesian governmentowned construction service provider, will build toll roads linking Kedung Badak to Kedung Halang and Pandaan to Gempol in Bogor through two contracts worth US$36.35 million and $24 million, respectively. Awarded by highways operator Jasa Marga (JSMR), the contracts require the roads completion in 18 months. The operator of the Tangerang- Merak Toll Road, Marga Mandala Sakti (Marga Mandala), will be allocating U$17 million to increase the toll road’s capacity. It