Contents

1 - Audemars Piguet: expansion and improvements in Le Brassus
2 - Designing the first Minergie-ECO® production unit
3 - Minergie-ECO®: the requirements of the new label
4 - A wood-fired heating system
5 - Telecommunications: playing it safe
6 - Revitalisation and reforestation of the Brassus stream area
7 - A welcoming entrance to the village
8 - High and medium voltage: the end of overhead electrical lines

High and medium voltage: the end of overhead electrical lines

Until recently, a 13,000V electrical line ran through the Orbe river valley like an ugly scar directly opposite the Manufacture des Forges. With the support from the Audemars Piguet Foundation, it was replaced by an underground electrical supply, and the last of the electrical posts were removed in May 2008.
Today, not a single electrical post spoils the view when the eye scans the horizon along the twists and turns of the Orbe heading for the French border. Through an initiative launched by the Joux Valley Electric company, the overhead electrical lines that once ran from the village of Le Brassus to the French border town of Bois-d’Amont are gradually being replaced by underground cables by the roadside, away from the protected marsh area.

Aesthetics and ecology
This major investment was not was not made for aesthetic reasons only: the elimination of overhead electrical cables allows the company to avoid conducting maintenance interventions in this fragile marshland which can easily be flooded by the Orbe as it meanders along its natural bed. The former overhead electrical lines planted out in the middle of nature, in a corridor where winds can get quite violent, was never safe from potential breakage. The disappearance of the often heavy repair lorries is a major advantage for this fragile ecosystem.

Leading the way
Six years ago, the Audemars Piguet Foundation already helped finance the creation of two underground 40,000V electrical lines around Lake Joux. The initial project called for an overhead line along the edge of the forest on both sides of the river, two installations that would have further diminished the beauty of the protected landscape in the Joux valley and a definite infringement on the surrounding forest. Nature advocates and the valley’s habitants banded together to fight the project, while helping to fund the new underground lines.

Everyone wins
It is not a rare incidence when tourists who discover the beautifully preserved landscape of the Joux valley express their surprise in seeing no pylons, and only a few relatively discrete overhead electrical lines. At this point in time, more than half of the medium voltage electrical network that supplied the towns is already underground.