Funding for cooperation between Northern European ports
Port cooperation in action: bremenports has joined forces with three Northern European ports in a jointly founded consortium: as part of the “Connecting Europe Facilities” EU funding fund of the European Climate, Infrastructure and Environment Executive Agency (CINEA), they are now jointly receiving support of 18.8 million euros for the supply of shore power to seagoing vessels.
With this support, the ports of Aarhaus, Gothenburg, Bremerhaven and Stockholm will supply shore power to container ships calling at their ports by 2030. Seagoing vessels will then no longer have to run on fossil fuels at the equipped berths during their stay in the ports. Overall, CO2 emissions are expected to be reduced by up to 35,000 tons per year.
“This fits in perfectly with our ambitious land-based power expansion targets: In Bremerhaven, the plans for two new, mobile and one fixed system at the container quay and one each at the cruise terminal and the car port are currently being implemented as a first step - in the long term, corresponding systems should be available at other berths later on,” reports Kristina Vogt, Senator for Economics, Ports and Transformation, who is delighted with the joint success of the four major North Sea ports. “Bremerhaven alone will receive funding of 5.23 million euros, which corresponds to around 50 percent of the cost of a single shore power connection,” said the Senator.
This makes it clear how great the financial challenge is, even for the currently planned expansion stage: “There is no question that clean berthing in the port is expensive - the shore power systems cannot be compared with simple sockets.
They are designed to supply container and cruise ships or car transporters which, even when moored in the port, have the power consumption of a small town with several thousand inhabitants,” says Senator Vogt. Despite the high costs, however, the expansion of shore power is by no means in question: “Powering ships in the port with electricity from renewable energies instead of marine diesel not only ensures cleaner air there, but also better working conditions for our colleagues in the ports.
Ultimately, the overall environmental impact is reduced - not only in terms of CO2, but also in terms of the emission of heavy metals and nitrogen oxides, which would otherwise also be emitted with the ship's exhaust gases.”
