Northern highs

Canada’s ports have been relatively untouched by the global economic turmoil, reporting maintained or improved on yearly volumes and pushing ahead with key expansion projects.

The Port of Montreal handled 28.4m tonnes in 2012, a decrease of just 0.4% compared with 2011, which had been a record year.

Tony Boemi, the port authority’s vice president, growth and development, says that, “considering the state of global economy and, in particular, the economic situation in Europe – the port’s main trading partner – we were very pleased with the result”.

The Port of Toronto handled 1.9m tonnes in 2012, which was a 5% increase over the 1.8m tonnes reported for 2011. According to deputy harbour master, Michael Riehl, for the current year, tonnage in some sectors is anticipated to be higher due to fluctuations in industrial demand.

Growing up

Exceptionally, tonnage handled by the Port of Prince Rupert in 2012 rose 37.62% to 5.6m tonnes.

“This was consistent with our forecasts,” says corporate communications manager Michael Gurney. “The regular year-on-year increases in overall port throughput since the Fairview Container Terminal opened in 2007 can be attributed to strong coal and grain markets in Asia and growing interest by shippers in the port’s speed and reliability.”

A new, fourth gantry crane at Fairview Container Terminal and the anticipated opening of the Westview Pellet Export Terminal will also boost tonnage in 2013.

Log volumes handled by the port in 2012 dropped quite dramatically because of technical issues related to log debarking at facilities in Prince Rupert – there is a very limited market in China for logs still encased in bark – but 2013 is proving to be better, because several new suppliers have come online. Grain traffic at Prince Rupert decreased 6% last year, but is up 18% in 2013 to date, reflecting different harvest yields.

“The current traffic ratio at Prince Rupert is typical of the state of affairs since 2007,” says Mr Guerney, who sees little major short term change, although additional capacity is being added for both container and dry bulk traffic.

Halifax rewards

For its part, the Port of Halifax has seen record levels of investment in infrastructure projects over the past couple of years.

“The recent C$35m pier extension at the South End Container Terminal is a good example of the type of work we are doing now to prepare the port for 2014 and beyond. The scheme was a joint investment project undertaken by both Halifax Port Authority and the Federal Government,” Patrick Bohan, the port’s business development manager, tells Port Strategy. “Our long term planning strategy is to ensure all terminals in the Port of Halifax – container terminals as well as those handling breakbulk – are well-positioned to secure new business.”

The Richmond Multipurpose Terminal project currently under construction is valued at approximately C$73m, the cost being shared between the Federal Government and Halifax Port Authority. According to Mr Bohan, this project will upgrade and expand the existing facility to enable it to handle breakbulk and project cargo.

“Once completed, the upgrades to Richmond Terminals will provide additional capacity for breakbulk operations, which will leave us well-positioned to take advantage of upcoming megaprojects planned for Atlantic Canada over the next several years,” he says.

Included among these is the National Shipbuilding Procurement Strategy, a multi-year C$25bn contract that will see several new Royal Canadian Navy combat vessels built in the Port of Halifax.

Other megaprojects in various stages of planning and/or development include: the C$1bn Shell Offshore Exploration Project; the BP Offshore Exploration Project, which will also require investment of C$1bn; and the Emera Maritime Power Transmission Line between Nova Scotia and Newfoundland (C$1.5bn).

“In all, there is an estimated C$115bn in megaprojects planned for Atlantic Canada over the next several years,” says Mr Bohan.

Land use

Montreal is also building on its solid base for future improvement: “To maintain our leading position as an intermodal gateway, we are continuing to optimise the use of port land, with the port authority redeveloping land in two sectors to increase container-handling capacity,” says Mr Boemi.

The 18.8-hectare Viau sector is being converted to handle boxes, while infrastructure in the Maisonneuve sector is being similarly modernised with container traffic in mind. The projects, which will conclude in March 2014, will cost more than C$40m.

Once this new capacity comes on line, Montreal will be able to handle up to 1.8m teu a year, an increase of 12.5%.

The port authority also owns land along four kilometres of waterfront at Contrecoeur, about 40 kms downstream from Montreal on the south shore of the St Lawrence River. This is part of a long term project to further expand the port’s container terminal capacity. Currently, the port is proceeding with technical, environmental and feasibility studies to develop this new area.

In terms of intermodal, the port’s own rail network has close to 100 kilometres of track. This is directly connected to Canadian National (CN) and Canadian Pacific (CP) railways, whose networks span Canada, west to east, and the US, north to south. Container trains are assembled directly at the terminals and then brought by port locomotives to the interchange zone where they connect with CN or CP locomotives.

All trucks serving the port – and there are up to 5,000 of them daily – go through a common entry portal, featuring optical and video character recognition units to identify containers, and 27 checkpoints equipped with an automated registration system where a computer recognises the truck driver’s fingerprint biometric and validates the transaction.

Rupert resolute

Meanwhile, while box traffic this year at Prince Rupert has dipped slightly – affected by seasonal fluctuations – here the port authority remains confident that year-end totals “will be strong”.

“We have raised the capacity of Fairview Terminal from 500,000 containers per annum to 750,000, while Maher Terminals, the terminal operator, is soon to decide whether to proceed with the Phase IIA expansion, increasing capacity to 1.2m containers,” says corporate communications manager Michael Gurney.

These developments on the container side are being complemented by the $90m being invested jointly by the port authority, CN Rail, and both provincial and federal governments, in the Road, Rail, Utility Corridor at the Ridley Island Industrial Site to create shared-use infrastructure for future potash and LNG terminals, with construction slated for Q4 2014 completion.

Elsewhere, Toronto is hoping its future contains more construction ‘staging’ traffic. Mr Riehl notes: “In the last few years, for example, the port has been moving into the ‘construction staging’ sector given the port’s adjacent location to Toronto’s downtown construction areas,” he says. As for intermodal connections, there is rail access on site, with major highways running alongside port facilities.

Toronto also handles project cargo, although volumes can vary dramatically from one year to the next. In the past, says Mr Riehl, the port imported and exported a variety of such cargo, including locomotives, steam generators, power plant and automotive plant machinery, mining equipment, steel pipe and plate.

Construction materials such as concrete, aggregate and sand, as well as industrial commodities, such as salt, come directly to Toronto from either ports in Lake Ontario or from the adjacent Great Lakes, where salt mines and quarries are located along or near the lake shore.

Agribulk commodities, most notably sugar, most of the time come directly to the port from Central or South America on ocean-going vessels. Generally, vessels offload a portion of their sugar cargo in Montreal (there being two sugar refineries in Canada: one in Montreal and one in Toronto) as ocean-going ships have to reduce their draft for the Seaway locks.