News

Port of Antwerp plays an increasingly important role in the reefer market. A growing number of reefer services from Latin America now call first at Antwerp. This resulted in strong expansion of 7.2% in the volume of reefer containers in 2019. The port's favourable location and excellent level of service have convinced shipping companies to choose Antwerp as their first port of call.

Pharmaceuticals logistics specialist Yusen is expanding its facilities in Antwerp. The Japanese company is starting construction of a new, semi-automated warehouse with 13,000 pallet places at its site on the Left bank.

The container volume handled by Port of Antwerp is growing year after year and now represents a large share of the total freight volume. In 2019 the number of Twenty-foot Equivalent Units (TEU) rose by 6.9% to 11.87 million. Additional space is now required in order to cope with this growth. In December last year the Flemish government announced a definite preference in the choice of alternatives for the complex project entitled "Extra Container Capacity in Antwerp."

In August 2019 Port of Antwerp launched a competition for a new technique to clean up plastic pellets that have been accumulating on the Galgeschoor, a stretch of foreshore on the river Scheldt near the port. A jury of innovation and environmental exports chose the Nul-O-Plastic technique offered by Envisan (a member of the Jan De Nul group) out of more than 50 entries. This solution uses a suction device to deal with legacy pollution

With the new Hakka platform hauliers are able to swap containers so as to avoid empty trips, thus also reducing road congestion and CO2 emissions. Hakka responded to a Request for Proposals by Port of Antwerp in 2018, and in 2019 alone it prevented 150,000 empty trips.

Port of Antwerp is taking yet another important step in the transition to a sustainable, low-carbon port. Eight leading players in the port area – Air Liquide, BASF, Borealis, INEOS, ExxonMobil, Fluxys, Port of Antwerp and Total – have signed a collaboration agreement as the first move towards the possible development of Carbon Capture, Utilisation & Storage (CCUS) infrastructure.

Intensive collaboration between Antwerp port community and West African ports

Seven leading players including Port of Antwerp have teamed up to investigate the possibilities for hydrogen importation and transportation

A new steel warehouse and service centre was opened by Euroports and Zimmer Staal on 4 December in the port of Antwerp