Eemshaven, Netherlands

Eemshaven: Submarine Cable Landing Point

Eemshaven is a seaport located in the province of Groningen in the north of the Netherlands, situated along the Ems estuary near the country's northern coastline. As a submarine cable landing point, it hosts three cables, making it one of the more active landing points in the Netherlands and connecting the country to the broader North Sea cable corridor. The cables landing here link the Netherlands with Denmark, Germany, Norway, and the United Kingdom, enabling intercontinental and regional connectivity across northern Europe.

Among the cables landing at Eemshaven, the IOEMA and IOEMA-1 systems are the most geographically extensive, spanning a multi-country corridor that includes four additional nations beyond the Netherlands. The COBRAcable provides a more focused bilateral link between the Netherlands and Denmark. Together, these three cables position Eemshaven as a node within the dense North Sea submarine cable network.

Cables Landing at Eemshaven

IOEMA is a submarine cable with a length of 1,620 km, with a Ready for Service (RFS) date of 2028 and currently in draft status. In addition to Eemshaven in the Netherlands, it connects landing points in Denmark, Germany, Norway, and the United Kingdom, forming a multi-country northern European corridor.

COBRAcable is a submarine cable spanning 304 km, with an RFS date of 2019. It connects the Netherlands and Denmark, making it a direct bilateral link between those two countries across the North Sea. It is the only active published cable currently landing at Eemshaven.

IOEMA-1 is a cable currently in draft status with no confirmed RFS date or length available. Like IOEMA, it connects the Netherlands with Denmark, Germany, Norway, and the United Kingdom, following a similar northern European routing.

Regional Context

Within the Netherlands, Eemshaven ties with Zandvoort as one of the leading landing points by cable count, with each hosting three cables. Other Dutch landing points including Domburg, Ijmuiden, and The Hague each host two cables, while Beverwijk and Callantsoog each host one. Eemshaven's position in the north of the country gives it a distinct geographic orientation toward the North Sea nations of Scandinavia, Germany, and the United Kingdom, complementing the routing profiles of its southern and western Dutch counterparts.

Network Role

Eemshaven functions as a multi-cable landing point rather than a single-cable terminus, with three systems converging on its northern port. Two of those systems - IOEMA and IOEMA-1 - share a broadly similar set of endpoint countries, while COBRAcable provides an independent, shorter bilateral link to Denmark. The combination of an operational cable and two draft systems indicates that Eemshaven is an expanding landing point within the Dutch cable landscape, with its future connectivity profile likely to grow as the IOEMA and IOEMA-1 projects progress toward their planned 2028 completion.

In the broader submarine cable graph of northern Europe, Eemshaven represents one of the Netherlands' northernmost access points to North Sea cable routes, bridging the country's national network to Germany, the Scandinavian nations, and the United Kingdom from a distinct coastal position not duplicated by the country's other seven landing points.