DEME wins orders worth ¢220m

DEME’s order backlog, which stood at €1.8bn at the end of 2007, has grown to more than €2.30bn. The company said it also anticipates a 15% increase in turnover, to €1.5bn, by the end of 2008.

Among the project secured by the company are one from the Mexican Department of Communication and Transportation, which recently commissioned Dredging International, part of DEME, to perform extensive dredging as part of a new LNG terminal in Manzanillo in the state Colima. The contract is for the first phase of the work needed to start operation of the new LNG terminal.

The work during this phase includes dredging 4.5 million m³ in a very shallow lagoon to create access to the LNG terminal. Two existing bridges over the access to the lagoon will be replaced by temporary bridges. DI will start the work this year but the bulk of the dredging work will start in the spring of 2009 using the large seagoing cutter suction dredger Vlaanderen XIX.

Dredging International also reports that, following the contract it received to deepen and broaden the Panama Canal on the Pacific Ocean side, it also recently won a new contract in Panama for dredging the access channel for the new PSA Panama International Container Terminal. The project consists of two phases in which a total of three jetties will be converted from use for bunkering petroleum into three jetties for Post panamax container ships. The work also contributes to the expansion of the Panama Canal, which is aimed at providing post-Panamax ships with permanent access to the canal.

Dredging International was awarded this contract as a subcontractor for the Colombian joint venture Alvarado & Düring – Vergel & Castellanos. The work includes the first phase of the entire project, during which one jetty will be built with an annual capacity of 450,000 TEU.

Altogether, Dredging International will dredge 1.5 million m³ of weathered rocky material for the access channel for this new container harbour. The company will deploy Vlaanderen XIXbetween this month and February 2009. The same cutter suction dredger has recently undertaken work on deepening and widening the Panama Canal.