His Excellency Sultan Ahmed Bin Sulayem, DP World Group Chairman and Chief Executive Officer; Zeyad Baker, Executive Director, Dutco Balfour Beatty LLC and Patrick McKinney, Area Manager, Middle East and Gulf, BAM International Abu Dhabi LLC – Dubai Branch, signed on behalf of their respective companies.

The ceremony took place at DP World Head Office in Jebel Ali and was attended by senior officials including Vice Chairman HE Jamal Majid Bin Thaniah, Senior VP and MD of UAE Region Mohammed Al Muallem, Senior VP Global Procurement Iqbal Khoory and Senior VP Project Management Adnan Al Abbar.

Under Phase 1, Dutco Balfour Beatty LLC is developing an operational yard area with a quay length of 1,200m. BAM International Abu Dhabi LLC is building a 400m bridge and adjacent causeways and the 2.2 km quay wall with an alongside depth of 18 metres, designed to accommodate the largest mega container vessels. CH2M HILL (Halcrow) will deliver the civil works on the reclaimed island north of Jebel Ali’s Terminal 2, connected to the mainland by a 3,000 metre causeway.

HE Sultan Ahmed Bin Sulayem, DP World Group Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, said: “We are excited to see construction work going ahead as planned for Container Terminal 4 in the run up to Expo 2020. We continue to support the transformation of Dubai into the world’s smartest city as envisioned by His Highness Sheikh Mohammed Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai.

“This terminal is the big idea that will change the way ports work in the future. We will deploy the latest technology in equipping our quays and yards, and run them with the most sophisticated terminal operation systems. We have a long track record of investing proactively to expand capacity at our operations to meet changing customer needs. We are building Terminal 4 from the ground up, which enables us to future proof it for smart container ships emerging in the future.”

Under Phase 1, Terminal 4 will add 3.1 million TEU (twenty-foot equivalent units) by 2018, taking Jebel Ali Port’s total capacity to 22.1 million TEU. The port will be equipped with at least 110 cranes with a total quay length of around 11,000 metres by that time.

DP World will further expand Terminal 4’s capacity to a total of 7.8 million TEU in line with market demand under Phase 2, with an additional operational yard with a quay length of 1,000 metres that will be built by Dutco Balfour Beatty LLC.

Zeyad Baker, Executive Director, Dutco Balfour Beatty LLC, said: “Dutco Balfour Beatty is honoured to be selected for this project. Our association with DP World goes back to 1976 when we undertook the construction of Jebel Ali Port. Our new partnership for this exciting new chapter in the port’s development demonstrates the long term nature of our continuous involvement in a port that emerged four decades ago to become the world’s largest man-made harbour. We thank DP World for the sustained trust they have placed in us.”

Patrick McKinney, Area manager, Middle East and Gulf, BAM International Abu Dhabi LLC – Dubai Branch, said: “We are delighted to be associated with a global trade enabler like DP World in developing infrastructure. We are grateful for their confidence in our expertise and capabilities to execute this engineering challenge. Our strategy of deploying advanced construction techniques, expert line management highlighting safety processes will underpin the delivery of this project on time and on budget.”

Terminal 4 will be equipped with semi-automated quay cranes, providing operational efficiencies for customers, comfortable and safe working conditions for employees and environmental benefits by reducing its carbon footprint.

Phase 1 will feature 13 of the world’s largest and most modern quay cranes, remotely operated from a sophisticated control room off the quayside. Some 35 Automated Rail Mounted
Gantry cranes (ARMG) will operate in the yard.

Mr Bin Sulayem, added: “With our 4 million capacity TEU Container Terminal 3 fully operational this year, Jebel Ali will have the capability to accommodate ten mega container ships simultaneously and the new Terminal 4 will increase that handling capability. It will be ready in time to meet the expected increase in trade over the next five years and to ensure Jebel Ali Port reinforces its position as the top commercial gateway to this region.”

When completeTerminal 4 will operate as a dedicated container operation, including storage of full, reefer and empty containers using modern container handling equipment.

Jebel Ali and other DP World terminals in the UAE handled 15.6 million TEU in 2015. Utilisation at Jebel Ali remains high at approximately 90%. Last year, DP World ‘s global
portfolio of container terminals handled 61.7 million TEU.

Speaking at the 1st Suez Canal Global Conference in Cairo, Mr Petropoulos said ‘One Belt One Road’ was not just about China but reached into around 60 countries: “many with increasing energy needs, and the Suez Canal playing its very essential part.”

Iran is probably the most notable frontier for new business within ‘One Belt One Road’, delegates were told. “Its trading alliances in Asia remain strong but with the lifting of sanctions the
opportunities for Iran are opened further, with long standing historical trading partners in Southern Europe and their demand for Iranian crude oil, all likely to be transported through the Suez Canal and the Sumed pipeline,” said Petropoulos. “In the 1970s and 1980s, the trend for crude oil produced in the Middle East was for Western demand but by the turn of this century the trend reversed with Middle East producers supplying the East. However Middle East refineries are also producing products for the region and are now exporting large amounts of products to global destinations as profitable trade, as well as a hedge to reduction in OPEC crude quotas. North East Asia is also producing gasoil which will find itself in the West. Major traders are fixing new building aframaxes and suezmaxes to load cargos of gasoil from refineries in Japan and Korea all transiting the Suez Canal,” he said. As Petropoulos stressed, in addition, India’s refinery programmes in the private sector have been very forward looking and they now export products with limited or reduced refinery capacity,
particularly in North West Europe.

“Those cargoes will transit the Suez Canal. With the demand for power combined with emissions, the LNG space is growing significantly and there has been an increase in LNG transiting the Suez Canal in the last 10 years.” Since the completion of the new dual carriage, the new Suez Canal will be able to handle almost twice the traffic. “And providing it remains commercially viable, this will lead to greater numbers of vessels navigating at both Suez and Port Said.

Increased traffic increases risk

In any environment where there is increased traffic there is increased risk of incident,” he warned. Jeff Wilson, Director of Marine Consulting (Europe) at Braemar Salvage Association, told delegates that the planned increase in traffic that will come from the development of the ‘One Belt One Road’ “will inevitably result in more vessels transiting and awaiting transit of the Canal at either end, and this will require careful planning and handling to mitigate the risk of increased traffic.” He said: “It may be useful at this point to remind ourselves of the most common types of marine casualty and consider how that feeds into a discussion on mitigating that risk. We’ve been gathering data on casualties since the business started, and we still maintain a casualty database that allows our friends and clients to accurately identify the risks that are relevant to their work or their projects. And our most recent set of data indicates that the top five casualty types across the insurance market remain the same as we would expect, with engine room machinery damage, groundings, fire/explosion and collisions and allisions all in the top four of all casualty types.”

According to Wilson, combined, those four categories comprise approximately 65% of the entire casualty load of the hull and machinery (H&M) insurance market claims record over the past two years, and the longer historical picture is not too different. “If we look at this over five years, we can see that the same dominant consequences arise when risk is not managed correctly. Looking at the cost element, we can see that the average cost of claims hovers around the $1m mark, with relatively minor variations over time. “One notable feature of the data is that the cost of collisions has risen dramatically over time, and now comprises almost 20% of the total. If we assume that the number of collisions has a relationship to the number of traffic movements and the proximity of vessels in a given area, then it’s reasonable to assume that there would be an increase in collisions if the volume of traffic in a given location was to increase over time. Machinery damage and fire or explosion are not traffic dependent, but it’s reasonable to assume that collision and grounding incidents are and, consequently, there may
be an economic impact on shipowners’ costs if they trade through an area of changing, increased and more densely packed traffic on a regular basis,” he said. The economic impacts of collision and grounding are varied, but there are common issues for shipowners following these incidents such as the cost of dealing with the incident, which can be considerable depending on the specifics of the incident, its location, the availability of support and repair services, the availability of technical expertise to recover the situation and the wider network of support available to the owner.

Wilson concluded: “Owners prefer not to have casualties because they take up significant management time and resources and can result in lost opportunities in addition to reputational damage. However, if an owner could choose to have a casualty he would prefer to have one in a location where there was a well-organised network of emergency response and possible pollution control, where there was access to quality repair yards with high quality labour at a reasonable cost and where movement of goods and services could be done rapidly and at low cost. Not all of those conditions exist in all locations, but even two out of three will reduce the immediate cost of the incident and consequently reduce long term costs.”

The contract was signed on 2 December 2015 and the first 10 Docking Stations were delivered on 19 February 2016. The amount of the contract is USD8.03 million (EURO 7.5million) and the first payment of EURO 6.6million will be made by TTL at the end of February with the balance paid early March 2016.

The Docking Station, patented by GAUSSIN group is tailored specifically to their ATT LIFT trailer. The combination of the two eliminates the use of straddle carriers. The ATT LIFT has an automatic guidance system which goes in and out of the Docking Station, and quickly and safely allows the transportation of containers.

In 2015, Gaussin has seen sales fall by 66% from EURO 122 million to EUR 6.6 million.