Reassuringly Extensive

Sales figures for both companies in 2009 were down, not only because of the tumultuous economic climate and its effects on global cargo trade, but also because they both recorded excellent order books in 2008. In that year, with 102 machines delivered, Liebherr passed the benchmark of 100 in the mobile harbour crane market for the first time, a significant 16% rise on 2007. Gottwald sold 92 harbour cranes in financial year 2008 -2009, including mobile harbour cranes and such derivatives as portal harbour and floating cranes, just shy of its 96 sales in 2007-2008. Upon announcing these figures in early 2009, though, Dr Robert Wassmer, Gottwald Port Technology’s CEO, acknowledged that the coming years would be challenging. For its part, Liebherr describes the performance of its mobile harbour cranes division in 2009 as being “satisfactory”, delivering 74 machines, a drop of 27% of the previous year’s impressive figure. However, the company argues that this compares favourably with a 40% fall in deliveries across the market as a whole. Furthermore, it reasons that from 2005 to 2008, Liebherr’s mobile harbour cranes deliveries averaged an increase of 19% per annum, “12% over the total MHC market growth average.” It also states that, despite the devastating economic instability of recent times, in 2009 the manufacturer was able to “increase its global market share substantially, by more than 60%, and reinforced its prime position as market leader.” Gottwald Port Technology has similarly strived to deal with the effects of the crisis. “Generally, our Port Technology segment is dependent on worldwide cargo volumes and growth in container handling,” says Marketing Director Peter Klein. “Declining cargo rates on the main container routes due to falling demand continued to have a marked impact on this segment. This [has been] forcing shippers to combine cargo routes and take container vessels out of service. The resulting under-utilisation of port capacity has prompted port operators to put off capital spending projects. Besides expansion spending, replacement expenditure has also come to a near-standstill, there being little demand due to the terminals operating at low capacity.” He continues: “Over the medium and long term, however, experts still anticipate further growth in global cargo traffic and therefore continuing demand for the relevant handling equipment.” In its interim report for the second quarter of its financial year 2009/10 (October-September), Demag Cranes AG, parent company of Gottwald, notes a slight positive trend towards new contracts being awarded in the mobile harbour cranes market. The Port Technology sector of Demag Cranes AG’s business accounted for Euro 43 million in the second quarter of the financial year, up 29.8% on income of 34.1 million over the same period in 2008/09. Comparing the overall first half of 2008/09 against the same period in 2009/10, the difference is just a slight rise of 0.2%, up from 74.6 million to 74.8 million. Demag Cranes AG’s order book for the financial year to date stood at Euro 290.5 million on 31 March 2010, down 32.5% on the Euro 430.3 million tally recorded on 31 March 2009. Within this figure, Port Technology business dropped 29.7%, from Euro 86.1 million to Euro 60.5 million. The report notes, however, that most of the revenue generated within the Port Technology sector came from mobile harbour cranes. “The second quarter of 2009/10 brought encouraging first signs of stabilisation in contract awards in the Port Technology segment,” it reads. “In particular, the demand for mobile harbour cranes picked up in the period under review. Some terminal operators consider that cargo volumes have reached the end of their decline and are bottoming out. It remains to be seen how enduring the upward trend will prove to be: for now, with terminals currently still under-utilised, idle handling capacity will be brought back into operation before there is any investment spending on replacement/expansion.”
Regional results
Looking at deliveries from a regional perspective, in 2009 Liebherr noted that European demand was particularly down, by 31%, compared to 2008 – with a notable downturn in Spain, usually the top-selling market. Deliveries to Russia, however, were quite some way above average, with the 17 machines delivered making it by far the strongest MHC market for Liebherr in 2009. In total, though, Liebherr received 35 mobile harbour crane orders from European customers during the year, meaning that Europe remained its largest market, with other regions catching up. India, for example, was one of the key markets for Liebherr, with the company selling nine units and further strengthening its position on the Indian subcontinent; since entering this market region in 2004, the company has delivered more than 40 mobile harbour cranes to India. In Africa, deliveries continued to develop positively, with the manufacturer stating that it accounted for 73% of the region’s MHC market through the supply of 19 machines. The fleet of African cranes is mainly used for container handling to cope with the constantly rising containerisation of goods on the continent. Following two years of burgeoning order books, deliveries to customers in the Middle East dropped quite dramatically, with just two Liebherr machines supplied across the year, although this included the company’s first delivery to Saudi Arabia since 2003. In total, two units were sold across both the Far East and Pacific regions, while deliveries to South America suffered a severe setback. With five units delivered, orders from the region were significantly reduced, particularly in Brazil – although, to quote Liebherr: “Brazilian ports are known for pulling the brake with any sign of uncertainty, waiting for circumstances to get clearer, but signs show now that the market is moving again.” Deliveries to North America didn’t alter greatly, coming in just under the five-year average with two units. When responding to World Port Development’s questionnaire at the end of April, Liebherr reported 12 harbour crane orders to date for 2010, to customers in Algeria (three LHM 120 models), Chile (two LFS 500 models), France (one LHM 180), India (two LPS 600 models), New Caledonia (one LHM 400), Papua New Guinea (one LHM 320), and the USA (two LHM 280 models). Based purely on official, public announcements, at the time of going to press, Gottwald had sold between 9 and 11 mobile harbour cranes in its financial year to date. The most recent of these sales was of two HMK 260 four-rope grab mobile harbour cranes, one each to two separate customers in Brazil. These Generation 4 machines will be used for handling different bulk materials. In April Gottwald received an order from the Norwegian NorSea Group for one new G HMK 4406, a Model 4 mobile harbour crane, which will be used in the Finnish Port of Hanko for handling pipeline sections for the new Nord Stream gas pipeline in the Baltic Sea. A month earlier, the manufacturer revealed that it had recently received an order from Integra Port Services NV (IPS) for its operations within the public terminal in the river port of Paramaribo, Suriname. This Generation 4 crane will be the third of this type to be delivered to IPS. Two HMK 260 E cranes, one new and one used, already operate at the Port of Paramaribo, handling containers and general cargo; the first of these was commissioned in May 2009. The company has also strengthened its position in the Middle East, receiving its second order for a Generation 5 crane in February from Beirut Container Terminal Consortium (BCTC), Lebanon (the first began operations at BCTC in December 2009). In addition to this, Gottwald announced that Qatar Petroleum had ordered a third G HMK 6407 Generation 5, Model 6 crane. Also towards the beginning of 2010, GPT received an order from Irish Continental Group for a new G HMK 6407, a variant of Model 6, complete with spreader, which has been delivered to the Port of Belfast, Northern Ireland. In November last year, the company received a
n order from Grenland Havn for a new for a new G HMK 4406, a variant of Model 4 – the first of this type to be sold in Norway. The least recent order for possible inclusion came from India, at the outset of October and the company’s financial year. This was for two G HSK 8332 B portal harbour cranes, variants of Model 8 and derived from mobile harbour cranes, for Adani Petronet. This represented a significant breakthrough into the Indian market for GPT. HYBRID THEORY Both Liebherr and Gottwald have exciting new technological developments lined up for their mobile harbour crane portfolios. When asked what has been the single most important innovation made in MHC design over the past five years, Klein responds: “It’s really a challenge to answer this question. Firstly, there is Gottwald’s Generation 5 [series], which is based on a pioneering modular design principle which fully meets individual customer requirements, in line with Gottwald’s philosophy of ‘You Name it, We Crane it’, and which includes the largest mobile harbour cranes ever built.” For a primary example of this sheer size, he cites the Model 8 crane, with a capacity of 200 tonnes at an outreach of 20 meters, resulting in a load moment of 4,000 metric tonnes. Offering intensive, fast container handling, including twinlift operation alongside vessels up to Super Post-Panamax size, the Model 8 also provides handling rates of up to 1,800 tonnes per hour in heavy-duty bulk handling, Klein details, depending on terminal and operating conditions: “Accompanied by extraordinary working speeds, with Generation 5, Gottwald as a supplier of harbour cranes was able to cater to new and more demanding applications.” He adds: “Secondly, Gottwald has adapted its successfully introduced mobile harbour crane design to portal and floating cranes like no other supplier in the marketplace. For example, we can offer turnkey floating crane solutions including crane, crane pedestal, crane maritime classification, barge design package and barge. The most recent development, which is in line with the green port requirements outlined by many operators and therefore meets an increasing need for both economical and environmentally compatible machines, is the new Gottwald hybrid drive.” Indeed, the manufacturer officially announced the introduction of this new hybrid drive in March. Using state-of-the-art diesel generators in connection with dynamic brake resistors and short-term energy storage, this latest Gottwald technology is designed to achieve fuel savings “in the double-digit percentage range”; a claim backed up by a pilot project carried out with one of its Model 6 cranes. The hybrid drive is part of the manufacturer’s ‘Green Range’ initiative to develop environmentally friendly and cost-effective technologies with “a view to making the sustainable management of maritime and intermodal terminals a reality.” The new drive system is an extension of Gottwald’s existing diesel-electric technology. It has been possible for some time now on machines that use electric drive technology, to return the energy recovered from the machine’s deceleration motions to the crane’s internal power system. However, if this energy is not required by the system at the time, the excess energy is dissipated in the brake resistors – in other words, converted to heat. Where, in the past, Gottwald details, these resistors could only be switched in relatively large steps, today it is possible to make use of dynamic brake resistors to improve the machine’s energy rating considerably. Gottwald has developed the new hybrid drive in response to demands for further improvements in efficiency, incorporating the aforementioned short-term energy storage capability, retaining the recovered energy and making it available to the crane’s power system for the next work cycle. The conventional brake resistors only come into play if the capacity of the energy storage system is exceeded. Gottwald states that the development of storage systems is particularly relevant to mobile harbour crane operations because they involve rapid load changes and irregular hoisting, lowering and slewing actions, including the associated acceleration and deceleration actions. Storage systems that can store and return energy quickly and allow high cycle rates in rough day-to-day crane operations are, the manufacturer reasons, necessary to optimise such operations and ultimately reduce energy costs. To develop the new drive system, Gottwald has performed tests on mechanical, electrochemical and electrostatic short-term storage systems. The hybrid system’s key requirements are met by what the manufacturer has snappily dubbed ‘ultracaps’ – friction-free double-layer capacitators with typical charge and maximum discharge times of 30 seconds in this kind of operation and with a service life of one million cycles. A key advantage of the system is that the energy is stored as electricity and is not converted at all, further enhancing efficiency. To prove the benefits of the new hybrid drive system in practical application, it has been put into work in the aforementioned pilot project on a G HMK 6407 mobile harbour crane, a variant of Model 6. This crane – which has a maximum lifting capacity of 100 tonnes, hoisting speeds of up to 90 meters per minute, and an installed diesel engine power of 895 kilowatts – has been put into operation at a maritime terminal, handling empty and full containers and fruit pallets for approximately 4,000 hours per year. The test phase began immediately after the installation of ultracaps and the machine’s upgrade to dynamic brake resistors. Along with the aforementioned double-digit percentage fuel savings, Gottwald states that this pilot project demonstrated the hybrid drive system’s quieter running characteristics and reduced noise emissions. Gottwald will also be offering the dynamic brake resistors and hybrid drives as an upgrade option for existing MHC owners. Gottwald believes that the new drive technology will be of particular interest to operators of MHCs with workloads and cargo handling profiles comparable to the aforementioned prototype, and for harbour crane applications such as intensive container handling. Furthermore, the manufacturer states that the new drive system is ideally suited to professional bulk handling, where cranes are configured as four-rope grab machines, equipped with two hoists and frequently working 6,000 hours a year. In the medium term, Gottwald plans to take advantage of the latest drive technology to downsize its onboard diesel engines to further enhance economical and ecological savings. “With its new hybrid drives, Gottwald has taken a further step towards improving the electric drive system used on mobile harbour cranes,” the company concludes, “electricity being the most energy-efficient source and, as a result, the one most commonly found in terminals.”
Liebherr also has an exciting, impressive technological development ready to announce; unfortunately, details are under embargo prior to its unveiling at TOC Europe in Valencia, Spain, on 8-10 June. A full update on this will feature in the next issue of World Port Development, which we will be distributing at the event. We can, however, report on Liebherr’s general response to our questionnaire regarding technological developments. Over the next year, the company states that it will increase its efforts to provide tailor-made mobile harbour cranes such as barge or portal solutions. The manufacturer delivered six rail-mounted LPS portal cranes in 2009. All LPS cranes are equipped with an electric prime mover, which makes it possible to run the crane on electricity from an external source at the port. Liebherr’s simple hydrostatic drive system remains as-standard on its MHC models, allowing the same components to be used throughout its entire range, from LHM 120 (lifting capacity 42 tonnes; radius 30 meters) to LHM 600 (lifting capacity 208 tonnes; radius 58 meters), to ensure high spare parts availability and a single system for engineering support. The company a
lso points to the hydrostatic systems’ low ‘moment of inertia’, providing “extremely fast acceleration times”. With this drive, Liebherr mobile harbour cranes attain a hoist speed of 120 meters per minute in less than three seconds, the manufacturer states. It adds that hydrostatic units work as one synchronous system, not just adding to general robustness, but also meaning energy is easily recaptured from the crane’s braking and lowering motions. The company adds that the hydrostatic system also avoids the power loss that you get through switching to other energy modes, such as the loss encountered in the banks of electrical resistors. The standard prime power of the hydrostatic drive system is a diesel engine, meaning the cranes are able to work with complete autonomy; however, all LHM models can also be equipped with an electric main drive. If the port has a quayside installation for shore power supply available, the crane can be operated directly with power from the harbour mains. Liebherr has again increased its spending on research and development as the company concentrates on creating new, ecologically sensitive technologies. The manufacturer states that it is involved in a number of projects focused on reducing carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. ExcitingTimes Reacting to both operator demands and environmental regulations regarding emissions, Gottwald Port Technology and Liebherr have demonstrated admirable application to provide cost-effective, green and customer-focused solutions to the mobile harbour crane market. A mobile harbour crane is a large investment for any port or terminal operator, and as both manufacturers fight to gain optimum orders and continue to impressively navigate through a remarkable period of economic downturn, they are doing so by introducing some of the most exciting technological developments in the market for many years. So impressive are these developments, in fact, you could almost be forgiven for being genuinely surprised.