Throughput of bulk cargoes 2010/2011 at the Port of Hamburg

Over the last year, the throughput of bulk cargoes at Germany’s Port of Hamburg has accounted for around 30% of the total throughput at the port. In 2010, bulk cargo throughput reached 40.3mt (million tonnes) and was accordingly up by 9.5% over the previous year. The main growth under this heading was in the form of imports of grab cargoes. Growth in inland steel production, for example, caused a 60.7% increase in iron ore imports to 9.3mt. At 10.3mt, imports of liquid cargoes were 8% higher in 2010. Increases of 9% in crude oil imports and of 14.3% in mineral oil products were the main factors behind this growth. The figure for suction
goods imports at 3.3mt failed by just 0.8% to reach the previous year’s level. Imports of wheat reached 632,000 tonnes and were accordingly 33.9% higher.
Exports of bulk cargoes in 2010 totalled 10.3mt, or 9.3% below the previous year’s above-average total. Exports of wheat and also of other suction cargoes remained well below the strong figure attained in 2009. On grab cargoes, exports totalling 3.2mt were handled, or 23.5%. At 2.2mt, this handling sector is dominated by fertilizer exports that were 28.6% higher. Exports of liquid cargoes, preponderantly of oil products, totalled 3.8mt and were 21.6% down on the previous year.
In the first three quarters of 2011 throughput of bulk cargoes was up by 1.9% and reached 30mt. The suction cargo category that at 4.5mt (down 4.4%) remained below the comparable total for the previous year, was notable for steep growth in imports of oleiferous fruits at 2.3mt (up by 21.1%).
HANSAPORT WITH NEW SHUNTING ROBOT
The Port of Hamburg is one of the most important transshipment locations for dry bulk cargoes in the world. HANSAPORT, Germany’s biggest seaport terminal for dry bulk cargo, handles around 15mt annually. Up to 110,000 tonnes of coal and ore can be discharged each day along the quays measuring over 1,000 metres in total. In 2010, the company Vollert Anlagenbau was commissioned by HANSAPORT to modernize the railway shunting systems which have been in operation since 1989, in an effort to reduce costs through the use of energy- efficient technologies and greater rationalization. To meet the efficiency target set, the engineers from Vollert developed the DER 240 shunting robot, an ideally proportioned shunting solution for intra-plant loading operations involving any type of commodity. New benchmarks are set by the much lower investment cost compared with traditional railway locomotives, the 50% reduction in operating costs thanks to fully automated, GPS-controlled loading processes, and the low environmental impact as a result of using diesel-electric drive technology.