Ports America Chesapeake (PAC) at the Port of Baltimore in Maryland has ordered 15 hybrid RTGs with remote control capability from Konecranes. They are due for delivery during H1 2022.
Container shipping and the global supply chain drew the world’s attention this month when Evergreen’s 400m-long 20,000 TEU vessel EVER GIVEN became stuck in the Suez Canal on 23 March.
Karmsund Havn IKS in Norway has signed a contract for a Liebherr LHM 550 mobile harbour crane, to join another LHM 550 that it acquired two years ago. That machine brought additional business to the port, and the second crane will help meet increased demand for project cargoes.
Goodyear has launched a new series of tyres for port machinery called the EV-4M Port Handler range. The tyres feature an updated radial construction, promoting a softer ride, improved tread wear and enhanced durability.
Latvian design and engineering company SmartTEH SIA already offers a ‘one-shot loader’ for loading long or awkward loads into containers or trailers (WorldCargo News, May 2018, p25) and this is now in service with several companies in the Port of Riga, such as KS Terminal and WT Terminal, as well as Jaunzeltiņi.
South Africa’s Transnet Port Terminals (TPT) is investing ZAR20M (US$1.36M) in a new automated gate system at the Port of Ngqura container terminal in the Eastern Cape.
Poland’s Port of Gdynia has received four international BOT bids for its 151-ha outer port project, which it plans to take forward under a public-private partnership (PPP), one of the biggest in Poland (WorldCargo News, December 2020, p16).
The Mexican Port of Manzanillo has set up a control group, GCM, to look into ways of preventing container theft. The group, which is headed by the Commander of the Sixth Naval Region, incorporates various federal agencies.
Russia’s federal seaport agency RosMorPort has started collecting ‘investment dues’ at the country’s 13 largest seaports. The order (1196/20) was made by Russia’s Federal Antimonopoly Service last December and published on 19 February 2021.
The International Forwarders and Customs Brokers Association of Australia (IFCBAA) is fighting a move by DP World Australia (DPWA) to implement increased landside charges at its terminals.
China Communications Construction Company has completed the first three berths at the new port of Lamu in Kenya, and the focus has turned to securing cargo handling equipment and developing road connections.
Mohammad Rastad, managing director of Iran’s Ports and Maritime Organization (PMO), has announced that a new port with the capacity to handle over 100 Mtpa of cargo is to be built at Jask in Southern Hormozgan province. The plan is to start construction in about four years’ time and then, through a series of phased developments, fully commission the port in 2032.
Turkey’s Mersin International Port (MIP) is pressing ahead with its near US$400M secondphase Eastern Mediterranean Hub (EMH II) expansion programme. Construction work commenced in mid-March, with the first stage of the work expected to take 20 to 24 months to complete.
Novorossiysk Commercial Seaport (NMTP) has invited bids for six new slewing portal cranes, in two phases – two multipurpose cranes with a minimum SWL of 40t and two heavier multipurpose cranes lifting at least 124t. All the cranes should be able to operate with hooks, grabs, magnets and elevating beams, as well as container spreaders and overheight attachments.
The conflict between the Port of Montevideo’s two container handlers continues, threatening a recent agreement between Belgian company Katoen Natie (KN) and the government.
CMA CGM, the Marseilles-headquartered shipping, ports and logistics group, has acquired Gulftainer Lebanon, which operates Tripoli Container Terminal (TCT) in northern Lebanon. The price of the deal has not been announced.
Ahmedabad-based Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone (APSEZ) has, at last, gained a foothold in Sri Lanka and, at the same time, bolstered its international expansion programme in the container handling sector of its business.
Pacific Logistics, which operates in Vladivostok Sea Fisheries Port, has taken delivery of a new Konecranes Gottwald rail portal-mounted crane. The two-rope crane will be used to handle containers and breakbulk piece goods, and is also equipped with a motor grab for bulk handling. It was installed and commissioned by Konecranes Demag Rus.
Russia’s United Wagon Company (UWC) has booked an order for 1,000 broad gauge model 13-6903, 80ft flat cars with a payload capacity of 74.5t from intermodal container operator Trans Synergy LLC.
A business/academia consortium in Bremen, Germany, called H2Cool Prelude, with backing from a research fund of the Bremen Government and the EU’s Regional Development Fund, is investigating the use of fuel cell-electric hybrid refrigeration units for road transport, using PEM fuel cells and green hydrogen (electrolysis from renewables).
The past two years have seen several liner shipping companies, including Maersk Line and CMA CGM, buy logistics companies, freight management entities and even an airline. Given the sector’s strong financial performance last year, further deals look as if they could be in the offing.
The first ship-to-container ship liquefied natural gas (LNG) bunkering operation in Asia has been completed in Singapore by FueLNG’s BELLINA, Singapore’s first LNG bunkering vessel.
Taipei-based Wan Hai Lines is revamping its independent liner network in the transpacific trade in a move it described as “better meeting stronger customer requirements”. The line has been operating on a standalone basis in the trade since Pacific International Line’s financial troubles caused it to withdraw from the trade last year.
Hamburg-based Hapag-Lloyd is expecting a strong fiscal performance in 2021 and will invest in new ships and container equipment, implement further facets of its ‘Performance Safeguarding Program’ and expand its presence in the faster-growing sectors of the liner shipping market.
In the past several weeks, a number of shippers, forwarders and NVOCCs have introduced their own shipping services using chartered vessels, to provide an alternative to unsatisfactory service levels offered by leading container carriers, combined with record high freight rates and port congestion problems at gateway ports.
Hapag-Lloyd, MSC, Wan Hai Lines and Evergreen Line have all taken delivery of sizeable volumes of new dry freight containers this year, and have placed orders for more.
The Institute of International Container Lessors (IICL) and the China Container Industry Association (CCIA) have held a virtual meeting and agreed to set up a joint working group.
Following successful trials in 2018-19, leading Japanese transport and logistics company Hankyu Hanshin Express (HHE) has started a regular sea-rail intermodal landbridge service for containerised automotive parts and other Japanese manufactured goods, using the Trans-Siberian Railway.
Rail operator Transnet Freight Rail (TFR) has run trial reefer trains to and from Cape Town Container Terminal and looks set to launch regular services
Double-stack trains were trialled between Mombasa and Nairobi in 2018 (WorldCargo News, November 2018, p18), and Kenya Ports Authority (KPA) has reported that a new regular service is being upgraded to carry 152 containers, up from 108 containers currently, “enhancing faster cargo movement and increasing efficiency at the port”.
Paceco Group and Mitsui E&S Machinery (MES) have announced the release of a new near zero emissions (NZE) RTG Transtainer and the launch of a zero emissions (ZE) RTG Transtainer development project.
Hydraulic port crane specialist Mantsinen Oy is extending its cooperation with Heavy Handling bv, its Belgian distributor. In future, the company will also act as distribution and service partner for France, covering the whole range of Mantsinen materials handlers, attachments and services.
Sany handed over 10 new SRSC45H1 reach stackers to the Port of Sudan Corporation last month. It is believed the equipment will be deployed at the Prince Osman Digna Port.
Konecranes has received another order for its Konecranes Gottwald Model 8 floating cranes from Jiangsu Zhenjiang Shipyard, again for seagoing barges for use by Cosco Bulk off the coast of Guinea. They will transload bauxite from river barges to oceangoing bulkers bound for China.
CSP Iberian Valencia Terminal SAU has taken delivery of 15 new terminal tractors from Terberg Benschop. These form part of a total €62M investment plan announced by CSP and have boosted its fleet size by 14% to 120 units.
FPT Motorenforschung in Arbon, Switzerland, part of CNH Industrial, is working on a project to use low-carbon Dimethyl ether (DME) fuel in an 11-litre industrial engine.
Austrian rope manufacturer Teufelberger has announced a new application for its HyperTEN synthetic fibre rope for crane applications. The company described HyperTEN as a “thermally pre-stretched high-end fibre rope for the highest technical requirements and ideally suited as a replacement for steel wire ropes”.
Data recently released by China’s Ministry of Transport (MoT) reveal that, despite COVID-19, container traffic handled at the country’s seaports rose 1.5% in 2020 to 234.3M TEU (see table). A further 30M TEU was processed at various river ports. This was virtually unchanged on the previous 12 months.
With Pifim and its partner Ports of Amsterdam apparently now out of the picture, privately owned Italian shipping and logistics group Grendi is seeking to take over part of the former CICT terminal in Cagliari. The company is in talks with the port authority, AdSP Mar di Sardegna.
Liebherr has come up with a ‘Smart Tyre’ system to reduce tyre wear on reach stackers. Before the tyre temperature of a Liebherr reach stacker reaches a critical level where tyre wear would increase excessively, the system automatically reduces machine speed. As soon as the tyres return to a low temperature level, the power is increased again.
Interest in non-rigid flipper systems on spreaders to prevent flipper damage continues to build. In China, Guangzhou Container Terminal Co Ltd has applied for a patent for a ‘lifting appliance guide plate’. The design comprises ‘guide plate body, elastic mechanisms and buffer devices’.
Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone (APSEZ) has expanded its portfolio by spending US$97.4M on buying Dighi Port Ltd (DPL). The general purpose port, which is being developed by Balaji Infra Projects Ltd (BIPL) under a 50-year concession agreement, is located about 170 km south of the city of Mumbai.
China Logistics, part of the state-owned China Chengtong Holdings Group (CCT) and a minority shareholder in Cosco, has signed a 99-year lease for a 20-ha plot of land in the freight village (GVZ) at JadeWeserPort (JWP), Wilhelmshaven. The deal means another €100M of inward investment for JWP.
Gemalink International Port (GIP), which is jointly owned by Ho Chi Minh City-based Gemadept (75%) and Marseilles-headquartered Terminal Link (25%), has finally opened its container terminal in southern Vietnam.
Klaipeda State Seaport Authority (KSSA) has contracted Danish dredging company Rohde Nielsen (RN) for €30M, of which €17.3M is from the EU, to deepen the southern part of the inner shipping channel to 15m, in order to increase the permissible vessel draught to 13m.
Confidence is building at the Port of Houston as it continues to grow its container business and attract new services, without suffering from congestion and declining service levels.
Chattogram Port Authority (CPA) in Bangladesh has awarded new contracts to ZPMC and Trans Gulf Port Cranes LLC to deliver new equipment at Chattogram (formerly Chittagong).
Shippers around the world are feeling the impact of the current capacity crunch as freight rates on many container trades head upwards to record levels, while at the same time, service and performance levels plummet to all-time lows.
Blue World Technologies, the Denmark-based methanol fuel cell (FC) developer and manufacturer, has closed an investment round in which it raised €6.4M. This has enabled it to sign a lease agreement for a new production building in the Port of Aalborg.
Mercè Conesa, president of the Port of Barcelona, has set out a new five-year development plan aimed at boosting the value of foreign trade passing through the port to €70B a year by 2025.
The environmental impact assessment report for the Skandia Gateway project has been completed, and the Swedish Maritime Administration and Gothenburg Port Authority (GHAB) have submitted permit applications and an EIA to the Land and Environment Court in Vänersborg.
Mexican senators have brought an Action of Unconstitutionality to the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation (SCJN) to try and prevent the transfer to the Navy Secretariat (Semar) of both maritime ports and the merchant marine
Rosmorport has awarded Inter RAO-Engineering (IRE) a US$81M contract to complete the Pionersky ro-pax terminal in the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad. All works should be completed by 20 December 2022. IRE has previously built a CHP plant in the exclave.
