A future after steel 14


The Tees has been the heart of the region’s industry since the 1850s, and now the port was finding a new role as a logistics hub, PD Ports group business development director Geoff Lippitt told a Tees Valley presentation at the Multimodal show on 19 June. “Teesport is well placed to


reach both the south and north of the UK, and 50% of the country’s population is within a three-hour drive,” he said. This has led to the concept of


port centric logistics, of which Teesport and PD ports has been a leading exponent, playing host to several major national distribution centres in or very close to the port estate. Rail as well as road links


have been strengthened. At Multimodal, PD Ports unveiled a new twice-daily train service to Doncaster – 90 miles away – adding to the two trains a day to and from lowland Scotland. PD Ports had worked with the Teesside Mayor to get


improvements on the direct rail


Middlesbrough and the South, which had reduce distance and journey time. Until recently, Teesport


was probably best known for importing iron ore and shipping out finished product from the one-time steelworks but those days – and the vast tonnages involved - will probably never return. However, ports should be measured by more than the sheer amount of freight, Lippitt argued; what really mattered was the amount of activity they generated. “We’re measured on tonnage, but what we’re really creating is value,” he said. “Our business is stronger, even though we’re ten million tonnes down on what we were ten years ago.” “We’re a good enabler,” he


explained. “For example, Peak Resources is bringing in the raw materials for Lithium batteries used in the next generation of automotive technology.” Mayor Ben Houchen pointed out that


Green teams get busy at PD Ports


PD Ports has held its first ever Green Week across its 13 locations, hosting a variety of environmentally-themed activities such as planting wild flowers, conducting beach clean-ups, car-sharing and creating planters from old hard hats. The initiative was the idea


of the Group’s Environmental Champions. Staff from PD Ports’ Teesside


sites at Hartlepool, Teesport and Billingham took part in a variety of events during the week, including litter-picks around Hartlepool and a beach clean- up at South Gare which filled a flatbed truck.


A team of 15 volunteers


also spent a day at the RSPB Saltholme nature reserve, working on resurfacing paths, while staff across the group took part in a car-sharing exercise, saving a total of 340 miles over the week. Chief executive Frans Calje


said: “The activities that took place will benefit the wider community and this is hugely important to our philosophy at PD Ports that what we do makes us who we are. The turnout across the business was hugely impressive and helped to not only raise environmental awareness but encourage teamwork and boost morale.”


route via Yarm between


a major future user of the port will be Cirius Minerals, currently developing a £3 billion mine in North Yorkshire that will be linked by a 23-mile underground conveyor direct to the port to ship out polyhalite fertilizer from Redcar Bulk Terminal, which used to serve the steel terminal. Lippitt added: “We have the


deepest water terminal in the UK – 19 metres – and can handle the largest, 100,000-tonne vessels. Also, the port’s land bank mean that significant amounts of processing are possible.” The Mayor added that the


South Tees Development Corporation was the first of its kind outside London and also had the largest brownfield regeneration site in Western Europe. Most excitingly, Teesside has


signed a deal that could make it the European capital of offshore wind, importing, assembling and re-exporting windmills for developments including Dogger bank and Hornsea. While


government prevarication has put some of this business at risk from continental competitors, there was an opportunity to create an industry employing an estimated 234,000 people in its supply chain. There is also a scheme to build


a new energy plant on the site of the former steelworks that would be the first large-scale use of carbon capture technology, with CO2 gas held in huge caverns under the North Sea. This would also help ensure the future of the chemical processing industry on Teesside, as swingeing new regulations on greenhouse gases increasingly make the old methods of chemical production


unviable. Even Brexit could bring


opportunities. The Mayor and PD Ports have made a joint submission to the government for a new freeport, something that would once again be allowed after the UK leaves the European Union.


The


Mayor said, depending on the eventual Brexit, there could be an opportunity to create a Jebel Ali style zone to stimulate manufacturing and processing. Lippitt added: “I think there will be perhaps two or three freeports, and we must make sure that we’re one of them.” Teesside also hosts one of Europe’s first large-scale uses


Issue 6 2019 - Freight Business Journal


///UK NORTH EAST


of LNG-powered ships, by short sea operator Containerships, now a subsidiary of CMA CGM. On land, it is continuing to


press for gauge enhancement of routes across the Pennines. Meetings have taken place with the Rail Minister to stress the importance of ensuring that freight is not forgotten in enhancements to rail services to and from north-west England and there has lately been something of a convergence of opinion, says Lippitt. There are four key structures


on the route to Manchester that could prevent higher containers being carried but these could be dealt with by, for instance, introducing different types of track in tunnels. Currently, much east-west


freight has to take a very circuitous route, adding around four hours to journey times. A more regional approach


could pay dividends in developing rail routes, said the Mayor, although people were naturally wary of giving up their local powers to a wider authority.


AV Dawson keeps it clean


Teesside family-owned logistics company AV Dawson has strengthened its


commercial team in


anticipation of some substantial new business. Richard Hodgson is project manager


commercial manager, while former


head of business


development Charlie Nettle has been promoted to head of commercial and marketing. Meanwhile, the company has been expanding the scale and scope of its business in and around the Tees, explains marketing and communications manager, Anthony Suddes. A year ago, the company won a major contract from British Gypsum to offload bulk ships, store the material and then transport it


to the company’s plant in


Eastleigh near Southampton. It has completed a canopy to keep the delicate product dry and free from contamination and, having initially started off with a road operation, is now sending three trainloads a week from Teesside. AV Dawson’s expertise in handling delicate materials


and Mark Tallon


such as steel also stood it in good stead for a rather more unusual operation – acting as a bio-secure operations base for a shipment to the British Antarctic Survey Rothera Research Station. Project forwarder Trans Global Projects (TGP) had been awarded the contract to ship equipment and construction materials to Rothera by construction firm BAM, which is in the process of removing the base’s old wharf and building a new one. The wharf will be used by


the new polar research vessel, RRS Sir Richard Attenborough. Antarctica not only has


one of the harshest climates on earth but its ecosystem is also extremely fragile and TGP and AV Dawson worked closely


together to ensure


that no harmful organisms or non-native species had contaminated the cargo, which underwent a strict cleaning and storage regime before being loaded onto the vessel. AV Dawson’s facility was


decontaminated weeks ahead of the first materials arriving in addition to a routine spraying


of insecticides, pesticides and herbicides along with a manual inspection to remove any weeds, insects or other pests. The project used several


areas of AV Dawson’s site, including the two large quayside fabrication halls which were segregated to create a manageable bio secure area for packing and palletisation. TGP also used the Environment Agency- approved wash pad to decontaminate cargo as it arrived. AV Dawson’s Tees Riverside Intermodal Park (TRIP) site received and stored over 90 containers for the project. As there was no construction


equipment or material at Rothera, all this had to be assembled and shipped on the vessel, including two 300-tonne crawler cranes, along with steel and cement – 13,000 cubic metres in all. TGP chief executive Colin


Charnock commented that, as far as he was aware, it was the first time such stringent decontamination export procedures had been carried


out at a UK port on such a scale. All containers and loading equipment were fumigated and everything was washed with ultra-high-pressure water jets.


timescale for


Suddes adds that the the operation


was quite tight. Supplies could only be unloaded during the short Antarctic summer – although the crews did have the


advantage daylight. Tunnel vision


Much closer to home, AV Dawson has also unloaded the first of two huge tunnel boring machines for Sirius Minerals, which, together with a second similar machine due to arrive on 22 August, will be used to create the 23-mile conveyor tunnel from the


polyhalite


mine near Whitby to Teesport. The company also stores


material from Cleveland Potash’s mine at Boulby, which is railed into the facility for storage and onward shipment. The TRIP intermodal


t erminal meanwhile has


15 >> of 24-hour


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28