The logistics centre will be leased to DB Schenker.

“Gothenburg is an ideal logistics location for our major import customers,” states Mats Olsson, President of Schenker Logistics AB.

The Port of Gothenburg is building a new logistics centre for DB Schenker. The 24,000 square-metre facility will be used mainly to store imported goods in preparation for onward transport to Swedish consumers.

­According to Mats Olsson, President of Schenker Logistics AB, Gothenburg is an ideal logistics location for import. “Proximity to the Port and the rest of the infrastructure means that we can deliver goods to the city regions such as Stockholm, Oslo, Malmö/Copenhagen and Gothenburg within a day.”

The new logistics centre will also generate increased volumes for the Port of Gothenburg. The terminal will have the capacity to handle 5,000 TEUS (20-foot equivalent units) each year. A large proportion will be completely new volumes for the port. This year around 900,000 containers will be shipped through the port.

“It is extremely positive that Schenker Logistics – one of the largest players in the logistics and transport sector – is about to establish operations immediately beside the Port of Gothenburg. The new logistics centre will consolidate our position as a port for the whole of Sweden,” says Magnus Kårestedt, Port of Gothenburg Chief Executive.

Construction will commence in January and the building is scheduled for completion in December 2013. The project has been developed by the Port of Gothenburg in close collaboration with DB Schenker, who will lease the premises, and NCC, who will be responsible for construction.

“It will be a modern logistics facility, environmentally classified according to Green Building standards,” states Henrik Bergman Head of the NCC Construction Business Area.

Once the building is in place, between 100 and 150 people will be employed.

Fendercare Marine, one of the world’s leading suppliers of marine products and services, opened their energy support base in Great Yarmouth in July 2012, initially providing support to offshore wind turbine support craft.  As well as existing shoreside support, Fendercare Marine Equipment and Lifting Services will also be offering mechanical, electrical, lifting equipment; hydraulic equipment and winches; lifting slings and load/stress monitoring equipment.  The new services are available not only to the renewable industry but to the oil and gas offshore sector and onshore industrial sectors, creating a truly unique energy support base.

The Great Yarmouth base provides mobilisation and demobilisation facilities, maintenance and repair facilities with land storage, fully equipped project management offices and bunkering services and is already proving a hub for all types of offshore activity in the Southern North Sea.  It incorporates more than 6,000 square feet of workshop together with over 10,000 square feet of yard and storage space, all in a dock side location with a 250 tonne crawler crane. With the launch of Fendercare Marine Equipment and Lifting Services, the base is expanding to accommodate an additional workshop space of 4,800 square feet, housing a wide variety of lifting equipment including a new 2,000 tonne lifting press.

Fendercare Marine has seen their Lifting Services division expand rapidly since 2010, providing support to not only the marine sector but also a large quantity of onshore blue-chip industrial companies throughout the UK.  The Lifting division also works with Hampshire Fire Service to provide animal rescue harnesses to Fire Services throughout the UK, and are currently working with contacts in Vienna to extend their reach to emergency services throughout Europe. 

Nick Connolly, General Manager of the Great Yarmouth base, said “This is a wonderful opportunity for Fendercare Marine to build on its first class reputation by further expanding its Lifting Equipment business. The Great Yarmouth site gives us versatility and flexibility to ensure we can meet our customer’s needs. Our dedicated team will be delighted to help provide customers with the products and services they require, and in addition our hire equipment fleet will ensure our customers can continue to operate fully while equipment is undergoing repair.”

The new division brings together several of Fendercare Marine’s UK based hardware sales and services divisions, adding new products and services, to ensure an ever more comprehensive offering  to both offshore and onshore companies.  This includes surface preparation through Blastgreen and load and stress monitoring services provided through Strainstall Marine, both Fendercare Marine companies. 

Eric Plane, Fendercare Marine Managing Director said, “The launch of Fendercare Marine Equipment and Lifting Services is a very exciting development for us.  We viewed this as an opportunity to bring together our Marine Equipment and Lifting divisions to provide an even more responsive service to our customers.  The success of our Great Yarmouth base has exceeded our expectations, so this move means we can help even more of our offshore marine customers and our onshore industrial customers.  Not only that, but it also demonstrates our long term commitment to East Anglia, generating additional employment and revenue to the Great Yarmouth economy.  Fendercare Marine is celebrating 25 years trading in 2013 and we are confident that this venture will be another great milestone in our history.”

This is the fourth order for the innovative technology in a long-running cooperation between Cavotec and the St. Lawrence Seaway Management Cooperation (SLSMC).

“Through the close working relationship between Cavotec and the SLSMC, we continue to develop and refine automated mooring for the unique needs of the Seaway,” explains Cavotec CEO, Ottonel Popesco.

Under the latest agreement, Cavotec is to deliver three MoorMaster™ 400LC units that will be installed at one of the SLSMC’s Beauharnois Locks. The Group will also support the SLSMC with on-site commissioning of the units.

Under its modernisation initiative, the SLSMC ordered two MoorMaster™ units that underwent trials in 2007 and 2008. The following year, the SLSMC ordered an additional two units that were installed in Lock 7 on the Welland Canal.

“Throughout our rigorous testing programme for MoorMaster™, we have been consistently impressed by how the technology makes great improvements in safety, and holds the potential to generate marked reductions in vessel transit times,” comments Terence Bowles, President and CEO of the St. Lawrence Seaway Management Corporation.

Cavotec engineers, working in close coordination with the SLSMC, have adapted MoorMaster™ to the specific physical and environmental demands of the Seaway. For example, the units already supplied securely hold vessels through variations in water level of up to 14m. The St. Lawrence Seaway is the world’s first inland waterway to introduce automated mooring.

Considered to be one of the greatest engineering feats of the 20th century, the 3,700km-long Seaway is made up of 15 locks, two in the US and 13 in Canada. It forms an essential trade link between the Atlantic Ocean and the Great Lakes at the heart of North America.

Staying in North America, Cavotec has also received an order to supply a detailed engineering study on the implementation of MoorMaster™ systems for ship-to-ship applications. This order follows a similar one received in 2006 and underlines the on-going interest in further developing and expanding the MoorMaster™ range.

MoorMaster™ is a vacuum-based automated mooring technology that eliminates the need for conventional mooring lines. Remote controlled vacuum pads recessed in, or mounted on, the quayside, moor and release vessels in seconds.

The technology is steadily growing in popularity across the maritime industry. It has been implemented at passenger ferry, bulk handling, Ro-Ro and container handling applications worldwide. The Group is also seeing interest in the technology for offshore applications.

Cavotec manufactures a diverse range of advanced technologies that help ports around the world to operate safely, efficiently and sustainably. These products include shore power technologies, Panzerbelt cable protection systems, crane controllers, marine propulsion slip rings, power chains and connectors, radio remote controls, motorised cable reels and steel chains.

This means that the final figure for cargo shipped in and out by sea this year is expected to exceed 34 million tonnes. In 2011, this was 35.5 million tonnes. That was what CEO Hans van der Hart of Zeeland Seaports was able to report last wednesday during the annual year-end meeting of the port authority and the ZPPC (Zeeland Port Promotion Council).

Half-way through the year, the Zeeland ports were still 8% down but, thanks to the good results in the last quarter in particular, the fall in comparison with last year is limited.

The main reason for the decline in is that transhipment operations which took place sporadically last year, no longer occured. Examples include the increase in incoming traffic by sea for the Zeeland Refinery as a result of the leak in the oil pipeline from Rotterdam to Zeeland Refinery. Also, the export of potatoes to Russia fell this year because the harvest there was very good. The increase in coal, artificial fertilizers and aluminium, among other things, was unable to compensate for the decline attributable to these co-called incidental deliveries.

The good news is that figures for inland shipping at Zeeland Seaports are expected to exceed 35 million tonnes: an increase of around 12%! That is an absolute record for the Zeeland ports.

Never before were so many goods transported to and from Zeeland by inland shipping. The growth in inland shipping mainly concerned chemicals, metals and other general cargo.

Together, the two figures bring maritime throughput to almost 70 million tonnes. This too is a record.

Last year, Zeeland Seaports entered into new lease agreements for about 26 hectares of land.