Flemish Government News

Belgium-based marine contractor DEME, on Wednesday, announced "a first" in Flanders, a region in the northern part of Belgium.Namely, its dual fuel trailing suction hopper dredger (TSHD) ‘Scheldt River’ is currently carrying out maintenance dredging work on the Scheldt river and during this work, the vessel is operating on LNG.In another milestone, DEME said that the ‘Scheldt River’ last week became the first dredger to be bunkered with LNG in the Port of Antwerp, near the Kallo lock.

Jan De Nul Group’s newest Trailing Suction Hopper Dredger Sanderus has just arrived in Belgium to execute maintenance dredging works in the coastal ports. Not just any dredger, but an ULEv with ultra-low emissions as this vessel has a two-stage catalytic filter system on board.The dredger Sanderus is Jan De Nul's fourth Ultra-Low Emission vessel (ULEv) that has been launched within the past year. The vessel was built in Singapore and left the shipyard in January after offshore tests. Another three major vessels with a same technology and ultra-low emissions are under construction.

Luxembourg-based maritime construction engineering company Jan De Nul announced its decision to opt for 100% renewable fuels."Jan De Nul Group carries out dredging work in the Benelux with 100% renewable fuel. With this, the world player is further committing itself to immediately and considerably reducing its CO₂ emissions," said a release.Trailing suction hopper dredger Alexander von Humboldt will from now on sail on renewable biofuel from certified and sustainable waste streams.The choice of 100% renewable fuel is part of the ambitious CO₂ reduction objectives of the Jan De Nul Group. In this context, Jan De Nul also wants to collaborate…

Jan De Nul Group carries out dredging work in the Benelux with 100% renewable fuel. With this, the world player is further committing itself to immediately and considerably reducing its CO₂ emissions. Trailing suction hopper dredger Alexander von Humboldt will from now on sail on renewable biofuel from certified and sustainable waste streams.The choice of 100% renewable fuel is part of the ambitious CO₂ reduction objectives of the Jan De Nul Group. In this context, Jan De Nul…

The Port of Antwerp has inaugurated the first Concentrated Solar Thermal farm (CST) in Europe as part of its efforts to make its operations more eco- friendly.The pioneering energy technology generates eco-friendly heat from concentrated sunlight that can be used by industrial companies, claimed a press release from Europe’s second-largest seaport. The plant was installed for Adpo by the Genk-based energy company Azteq as part of a pilot project co-financed by the Flemish government.Industrial companies normally obtain heat for their processes from combustion of fossil fuels such as natural gas. Concentrated Solar Thermal energy (CST) is an innovative technology in which sunlight is concentrated by parabolic mirrors and so converted directly to heat.

Europe’s second-largest seaport Port of Antwerp is building additional container handling capacity in the Antwerp port area.To cope with further growth until 2030 and also to attract international investment in the future, additional capacity of 7 million containers per year is required, said a press release from the port in the heart of Europe accessible to capesize ships.With the ECA Complex Project the Flemish government is considering the best location for this additional handling capacity. The investigation is multidisciplinary, consisting of various detailed studies.ECA focuses on three objectives: Creating additional container handling capacity…

The Austrian petrochemical company Borealis has announced that it is to build a new production plant on its existing site in Kallo, in the Antwerp port area.According to a press release, the propane dehydrogenation (PDH) plant will use the very latest technology in terms of sustainable production and energy efficiency. With this initiative the port of Antwerp confirms and reinforces its role as the largest chemical cluster in Europe.The intention to build a new PDH plant to convert propane into propylene has been known for some time. The propylene in turn can be used to make polypropylene, a plastic with many applications which is employed in among others the car industry.Borealis has now decided to build this new plant at the existing Borealis production site in Kallo.

After a record first three months the port of Antwerp has also had an excellent second quarter with May as the best month ever. During the first six months of the year the port handled 118,648,143 tonnes of freight, a sharp increase of 6.5% compared with the same period last year. The main driver continues to be container freight which experienced further rapid growth of 8.2% compared with the first six months of 2017. The strong freight figures for the first quarter continued unabated in the second quarter. The container volume for its part rose by 8.2% to 66,298,043 tonnes. In TEU this indicates an increase to 5,567,905 TEU (up 8.3%). May was an all-time record month, with the port of Antwerp handling a peak container volume of more than 1 million TEU.

The port of Antwerp is to invest 1.4 million euros over the next three years in projects aimed at making port-generated freight traffic smoother and more efficient. The seven projects that have been selected for financial support will together reduce the number of truck trips by up to 250,000 annually. The Flemish government in turn is building on the Call for Proposals by the Port Authority, and in the next few months it will release a further 1.4 million euros for projects to make transport in and around Antwerp more sustainable. “Mobility on the Flemish roads concerns all of us,” declared Antwerp Port Authority CEO Jacques Vandermeiren at the sixth Intermodal Event organised by the Port Authority.

The Antwerp port community has drawn up an action plan to make container barge handling in the port more efficient. Container handling has come under heavy pressure in some shipping terminals over the past few months. The rapidly growing volumes and the ever larger sizes of seagoing ships calling at the port in combination with labour shortages have led to peak loads on the terminals, with long waiting times for container barges as a result. Since barge traffic is important for the port community as a whole, for sustainable transport of freight to and from the hinterland, serious efforts have been put into drawing up an action plan in the past few months aimed at making structural improvements in the short term.

The new Port House in Antwerp repurposes, renovates and extends a derelict fire station into a new headquarters for the port – bringing together the port’s 500 staff that previously worked in separate buildings around the city. With 12 km of docks, Antwerp is Europe’s second largest shipping port, serving 15,000 sea trade ships and 60,000 inland barges each year. As the threshold between the city and its vast port, Mexico Island in Antwerp’s Kattendijk dock on Quay 63 was selected as the site for the new head office. The waterside site also offered significant sustainable construction benefits, allowing materials and building components to be transported by water, an important requirement to meet the port’s ecological targets.

The port of Antwerp is on course to handle more than 200 million tonnes of freight this year for the first time ever. And in container transhipment too a new record has been set, with more than 9 million TEU (twenty-foot equivalent units, i.e. standard containers) being handled. In comparison with last year nearly 8% more containers will be transhipped. With these growth figures Antwerp is performing significantly better than Rotterdam and Hamburg, the number 1 and 3 ports respectively in North-West Europe. The port of Antwerp has a particularly rich history. Ever since the Middle Ages ships laden with cargo and passengers have found their way up the river Scheldt to Antwerp.

The Port Logistics seminar was officially opened on Wednesday this week by Alexander De Croo, Belgian deputy prime minister and minister of Development Cooperation, Digital Agenda, Telecom and Postal Services. The seminar is organised by APEC-Antwerp/Flanders Port Training Center, the training institute of the port of Antwerp. It is being attended by 33 participants from 21 different countries including Indonesia, Ukraine and Vietnam. Such seminars and courses enable the port of Antwerp to make its know-how, expertise and other advantages known around the world. However they would not be possible without input from port companies and the financial support of the Flemish government and the development aid provided by the Belgian national government.

Antwerp Gateway, managed by DP World (one of the largest container terminal operators in the world) is a significant contributor to the success of the Port of Antwerp. Eddy Bruyninckx, CEO of the Antwerp Port Authority, met with Mr. Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem and Mr. Mohammed Sharaf, respectively chairman and CEO of DP World, on Thursday during the Belgian mission to Dubai headed by HRH Princess Astrid. After the meeting both CEO’s took part in a lunch, in presence of HRH Princess Astrid. Already in 2014 the worldwide growth figures for DP World were extremely positive, with the total volume up 8.9% to 60 million TEU. The fact that a significant part of this growth was generated in the port of Antwerp…

The four gates for the Deurganck dock lock in the port of Antwerp will begin their journey from China at the beginning of April. The gigantic gates are being built by the Chinese steel constructor ZPMC, together with the trolleys on which the gates will ride, two combined road/rail bridges, the caisson and other items. A ceremony was held on Wednesday 18 March in the Chinese city of Changxing to mark the official completion of the construction work. The ceremony was attended by Freddy Aerts, head of the Maritime Access department (Flemish government), Luc Arnouts, director of the Deurganck Dock Lock Company and also Chief Commercial Office of the Port Authority, and Eric Beyts from the Waasland Lock construction consortium. Mr.

ICO and AET, the two ro/ro terminals in the port of Antwerp, are now also connected to the e-Desk. The Antwerp Port Community System (APCS) introduced the e-Desk for containers already in 2012, and this year the successful collaboration has been extended to rolling stock. The port of Zeebrugge (ICO and WWL) started the e-Desk for ro/ro in February, and now the Antwerp terminals are following suit. All exports of new and second-hand vehicles and exports or transit of containers can now be declared electronically, so that paper declarations and accompanying documents are no longer necessary. Each player who has four obligatory data items that form part of the export declaration can enter these parameters in the e-Desk.

The board of directors of Antwerp Port Authority has approved the long-term financial plan (2011-2025), representing an amount of $2.2b. With this ambitious investment plan the Port Authority is banking on the future. This plan is only possible thanks to the sustainable financial policy that the Port Authority has followed in recent years. "It is these financial results, without trying to maximize profits, that even after a period of crisis give us a sufficient financial basis to implement this investment program that is so important to our customers, and to go ahead with the priority activities and investments," said Port Authority CEO Eddy Bruyninckx.

Work Starts on the Biggest Lock in the World in the Port of Antwerp. In the Port of Antwerp the construction of the second lock on the Left Bank has officially started. Over the coming years the new construction project will be one of the biggest infrastructure projects in Belgium, with 255 people working daily on building the biggest lock in the world. The lock is due to open in 2016 and will cost around EUR 340 million of which 50% will be financed by the European Investment Bank. The Flemish KBC Bank is also making available a EUR 81 million credit line, with the balance being provided by the Antwerp Port Authority and the Flemish Government. In recent years the development of the Port of Antwerp has been concentrated on the Left Bank.

Recognising that LNG is one of the best solutions for complying with upcoming emission regulations for ships, DNV is currently conducting a feasibility study for the Flemish Government relating to the provision of LNG bunkering facilities in three Belgian ports. The annual Process & Asset Risk Management Conference (PARC) focused on LNG opportunities in addition to debating the future of energy supply. The conference, which was hosted by DNV in Brussels, brought together EU regulators, industry experts and port representatives. Antwerp, Zeebrugge and Ghent add to the list of European ports making an investment in LNG bunkering facilities, which includes ports in the Netherlands, Sweden, Finland and Poland.

A unique, particularly attractive investment location of 96 hectares has become available in the port of Antwerp, the second largest port in Europe. The site in the heart of the European Union is particularly suitable for industrial development. The zone offers a number of intrinsic advantages including trimodal access and an existing area of ready-to-use buildings. These are amplified by the environment in which the site is embedded: a port that functions as the gateway to Europe, where every investment is leveraged by the presence of a highly integrated chemical cluster and a wide range of logistics and value-added services. No other port in North-West Europe is currently able to offer such an industrial investment opportunity.

Damen delivers silent in operation Research Vessel ‘Simon Stevin’ to DAB Vloot, the Flemish Government fleet operator. The RV 3609 was jointly designed by Damen Shipyards Gorinchem and VLIZ, the Flemish Institute for the Sea. While hull and hot works were built at Damen Shipyards Galati (Romania), the outfitting was done by Maaskant Shipyards Stellendam (The Netherlands). The ‘Simon Stevin’ will be used offshore for scientific research on climate change, sustainable fishing, energy production at sea and for educational purposes.

The Flemish government and the port authorities of Antwerp, Zeebrugge, Ghent and Fluxys have published a feasibility study on LNG bunkering. DNV provided a market forecasting study, a regulatory analysis and modelled the LNG supply logistics. The Flemish government is now acting on DNV recommendations to ensure the safe introduction of LNG bunkering at Flemish seaports. The market study led to a forecasted LNG bunkering demand for each port derived from shipping and world energy market forecasts, while the logistics model allows the ports to simulate, compare and calculate costs of different LNG bunkering supply chain options. The combined results serve as strategic and tactical decision support tool for the ports in developing their LNG bunkering infrastructure.