With ambitious expansion plans and good preconditions to meet today’s needs, the Port of Gdansk seeks to become a new hub for the whole region. The Port Authority plans to develop new facilities only on demand to reduce the risk of having a port without cargo
The year 2015 has been the most successful year in the history of the Port of Gdansk, despite the economic[ds_preview] situation of important trade partner Russia, Julian Skelnik of Port of Gdansk Authority emphasizes. »Poland itself grows and so do other areas around us.« 35,914,000t were handled, the most important cargo segment is liquid fuels which account for almost 39% of the port’s total throughput. For them a new crude oil terminal is being built. The first phase encompasses six tanks with a capacity of 375,000m3. In a second phase of construction the capacity will be expanded by additional 325,000m3.
But the plans for the outer port reach out further into the sea. The access infrastructure is planned to be adapted to larger vessels and more traffic. This includes widening of the existing fairway, a new fairway for the outer port, new turning circles and breakwater structures. The investment value is 181mill. €.
Not limiting themselves to better accessibility, the port authority has the vision of a new deep-water outer port that would be built on reclaimed land behind the Westerplatte peninsula. A rendering shows a large area with container berths, other general cargo piers and warehouses. »It is just to give an impression of what it might look like,« Port Authority President Dorota Raben says. »There is no decision made yet, what will be out there. We are not only talking about containers.« Demand would decide what would be in the new areas. »In Gdansk we also need piers for bigger cruise ships. The Poles might start cruising soon,« Raben says.
The idea is also to develop the port not in one big step but as a modular system. »The port can grow into the sea, driven by demand,« Raben explains. According to her, there is already a lot of interest from a number of companies to invest in the new deep-water port, most of them focusing on building it. But the port authority is not interested in bearing the risks of overdesigned facilities that might remain unused. Therefore they are looking for investors who will also operate the facilities and guarantee demand. The concept phase lasts until 2018 when the implementation phase is to start. The value of the investment totals 1.8 bn. €.
With both the Port of Gdansk and its well-known Deepwater Container Terminal (DCT) planning expansions or already expanding, the question is whether there will be too much competition for cargo within the Gdansk port area. But Dorota Raben says, »It is just a plan for the possible terminal areas. What kind of cargo will be handled there will be determined by demand.«
Another field, in which the port prepares for the future, is Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG). »So far there has been no demand for LNG bunkering in Gdansk, but we already have the regulatory framework ready to offer a truck to vessel service,« Skelnik explains. Poland’s port for LNG cargo is not located in Gdansk but in Swinoujscie.
Meanwhile there are no plans to shut down the inner port – quite the contrary. There is a lot of traffic down the Dead Vistula river into the port in the heart of the city, mostly smaller ships that come more frequently than the big carriers, Skelnik explains.
Compared to the schemes for the outer port, the port authority’s plans for the city port seem humble: The entrance to the inner port will be modernized for 36mill. €. The port currently has a draft of 10.2m which is planned to be dredged to a depth of 10.8m, thus making it navigable for vessels up to Panamax size. The works are scheduled for 2016 until 2020.
The new boy on the block
What are still plans and visions for the new outer port is already being implemented at DCT. The terminal started operating in 2007 and does not only serve the growing Polish market but also Russia and the Baltic states. In terms of container handling Gdansk is the largest port in the Baltic with a throughput of 1.25mill. TEU. In terms of total throughput only St. Petersburg is bigger. Until February 2015 Maersk was DCT’s only customer. Now ships of the 2M and G6 alliances call at DCT Gdansk. »For megaships we need a mega port«, DCT-CEO Maciek Kwiatkowski says.
However 2015 has been the first year with a decline in container volumes for DCT, because of a 30% drop in transshipments to Russia. But additional volumes from the new alliance customers helped to absorb a big part of the losses. In the end DCT was 10% down on the 1.2mill. TEU of 2014. Although the Russian economy is still in a recession, Adam Zolnowski, CFO of DCT, remains confident. Russia would always have to import goods, also with a weak economy. Volumes might go down some more but not over night and never down to zero. »Whether there are cheap or expensive goods in the containers does not matter to us as a terminal operator,« he adds.
Already the construction machinery is at work. Unlike Terminal 1, which was built on reclaimed land, the new Terminal 2 is being constructed on existing land between Terminal 1 and the dry bulk terminal of the Port of Gdansk. Additional 650m of deep-water berth and five ship-to-shore cranes will increase DCT’s capacity from 1.5 to 3mill. TEU.
The new gantries will even reach containers stowed in 25 rows. At Terminal 1 the cranes only go 18 rows across and that is why some vessels have to be turned around to be fully unloaded. »DCT was meant for feeder and RoRo traffic in the beginning,« Kwiatkowski says. »T2 will be a specialized ULCV facility, prepared for the largest container ships that can get into the Baltic.« The economies of scale would work for Gdansk rather than for traditional ports, especially with the SECA regulations now in force, the CEO is confident.
By offering the same standards as the competitors in the west the terminal further strengthens its position. Of course in the beginning the purchase of Chinese-built STS cranes was considered, Kwiatkowski explains. It would have been cheaper but the manufacturers were not able to stick to the specifications. Now the terminal is equipped with six Post-Panamax STS cranes built by Liebherr in Ireland. The 20 rubber tire gantry cranes (RTG) are also from Liebherr and Kalmar.
The bigger cranes for T2 will be delivered by Liebherr as well. 16 RTG cranes will operate at the new facility. The schedule is ambitious: the infrastructure will be finished in mid 2016, shortly after the equipment will have arrived. By the end of the year T2 will be ready to start operation. T1 and T2 combined will comprise a 76ha area.
And there are even further visions for DCT for the time when the capacity of both terminals will get exhausted. The area of Terminal 1 could be lenghtened 300m northward, extending the berth’s length to 1,000m. »So you could say we get closer to Sweden,« Kwiatkowski jokes but adds »of course we do not intend to compete with the big Swedish ports«. Another plan would be to mirror the existing terminal, expanding it by 200m to the east side. That would be more complex, because besides land reclamation the seabed at the berth would have to be dredged to greater depth. It might also be the least popular expansion variant because of the public beaches which would become partly inaccessible or even disappear.
Gdansk as a new Baltic hub
The expansion of the Port of Gdansk incorporates the ambition to establish a new hub for the Baltic. »It is important we understand our position,« Kwiatkowski says. »Gdansk is not a Polish port but a port for the region.« There may not be the large port facilities like in the competing North Range harbours yet. But another advantage is that Gdansk can build them relatively cheaply and it can build them to today’s standards and dimensions.
One big advantage the ice-free port already offers is its easy accessibility. It can be reached by the biggest vessels that can access the Baltic through the Danish Straits, with a maximum draft of 15.4m. Piloting to the outer port terminals takes no more than two hours, the pilot station is only 7 nm away.
For investors and customers that seek to import and export via Gdansk the port is getting more attractive also from the land side. Behind DCT the new »Pomeranian Logistics Centre« is being built by the Australian company Goodman – 500,000m2 of storage areas, warehouses, production and office spaces. One of the tenants is the German logistics company Kühne + Nagel.
Gdansk wants to be a port not only for short-sea traffic to the countries around the Baltic. The government of the region of Pomerania is currently increasing its efforts to make the port a hub for import and export cargo from Poland and its surrounding Eastern European neighbours. As for the ports of the North Range, a wide hinterland and a good hinterland connection are crucial to Gdansk. Via road and rail the Polish hinterland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia are getting closer to the port. The Poles are also working on connections to Ukraine and Belarus.
»Once there was the so called Le Havre–Hamburg range, now it would be more adequate to speak of a Le Havre–Gdansk range,« Captain Kwiatkowski says. »We are the new boy on the block.«
Felix Selzer
