Nick Atkins from Jo Bird joined representatives from a number of UK companies on a tour organized by Helen Stephen at the Society of Maritime industries. The purpose was to better understand the operations and future developments at a modern commercial port as well as get to know others in the UK supply chain for this sector.
The port in question was the vast Port complex of Antwerp Bruges in Belgium. This port is in the top 10 container ports in the world and handled 13,484.122 TEU last year alone. Not only containers, it also deals with breakbulk and chemical products. Bruges is also the largest port in the world when it comes to roll on roll off traffic. According to their figures it also transits 15% of Europe’s gas.
What impressed us most, apart from the wonderful hospitality shown to us by our hosts, was just how much continuous development has gone on over the years. If anything, this has accelerated in recent times with improvements to the dockside infrastructure and increased water depths to accomodate larger vessels.
The port is working hard to improve its credentials when it comes to sustainability with trials of various renewable/lower CO2 fuel options for their fleet of tugs was just one of a number of initiatives very were undertaking. Another was an extensive area dedicated to the recycling of plastics and other waste materials.
It was a fascinating visit and a great example of what can be done to reduce the environmental impact of commercial shipping. Our sincere thanks to Helen at the SMI and Patrick, Michel, Sofie and Luk at the Port of Antwerp Bruges.