Cuxhaven expansion gets green light

The go-ahead came from the local state of Lower Saxony. It means that busy Cuxhaven – which once rivalled Wilhelmshaven as a candidate for a German deep-water container port – can continue to grow.

The three new berths will fill a 1,250m gap which currently exists between the Cuxport Europakai Terminal and the Offshore Centre on the Elbe and create a 28 hectare handling area behind them. Once the new Berths 5-7 have been built and the area filled in, Cuxhaven will boast 3,580 m of quayside and nine berths for handling containers, break-bulk cargo, vehicles and offshore wind farm components.

The port upped its handling to 2.65 million tons last year – a whopping one third increase over 2018. A big increase in the handling of building materials was reported a main impetus for the rapid growth.

Lower Saxony Ports (N-Ports), which owns and operates the port, applied early for permission to build the new berths because Berths 1-3 at the Europaka have been working at full capacity for some time. The adjoining heavy lift Berth 4 – opened as recently as September 2018 – was also reported near saturation while at the other end of the frontage ‘gap’, Berths 8 and 9 at the Offshore Base completed in 2012 continue to “do well”, officials said.

NPorts will now extend a European-wide invitation to tender for the construction work. Before that work starts, tenders for the operation of terminals on the new sites would also be invited, it said.

N-Ports Managing Director Holger Banik said the construction of port facilities involves long-term planning and noted that prior to the latest application for approval, it had commissioned a number of feasibility surveys. They included studies of ship maneuverability, seabed conditions and studies into the ecological and wildlife effects of the new developments.

NPorts has acknowledged that the new facilities will encroach on natural resources and has acquired 65 hectares upstream to compensate. “We are actively designing the future of the ports and we care about the entire region and its economic development”, the company said.