A look at Nalcor's marine Labrador-island cable crossing

A drilling project underneath the Strait of Belle Isle on the Northern Peninsula aims to connect Labrador to Newfoundland with an underwater cable.

Nalcor Energy will be drilling three holes along the sea floor between Shoal Cove and Forteau.

Greg Fleming, Nalcor's project manager, said the company is using directional horizontal drilling to get down about 80 metres below the ocean's surface.

"Things are going quite well actually. We've drilled about 1,000 metres so far into the first hole, and we've been drilling for about a week so the productivity is quite good," Fleming said.

Fleming said despite the good progress on the project, it will still be a couple of years before power from the Lower Churchill can be sent to Newfoundland.

"We anticipate that it will take a couple of months to drill the three holes on this side. We'll move the rig to the other side and then drill the holes over there. We should be complete by the end of 2014," Fleming said.

He said there are still a few stages of development before the cable will even be installed.

"The plan is to execute the drilling this year and next year, and we've got a lot of land-cable installation that will happen in 2015," he said.

"All this is getting ready for the main cable install. The cable shipment comes July 1 of 2016."