Tag: Panama Canal Expansion

Panama Canal Expansion - LNG vessel Transit

Panama Canal s Growth Prompts U.S. Ports to Expand

A wider, deeper Panama Canal will open in 2014 A wider, deeper Panama Canal will open in 2014, meaning that bigger cargo ships filled with more containers of consumer goods can move directly to the population centers of the East Coast instead of stopping on the West Coast and sending the goods across the country.States with seaports along the Atlantic are asking for hundreds of millions of federal dollars to deepen their harbors and shipping channels to accommodate the bigger ships and capture a slice of the growing traffic.But some global supply-chain experts say the optimistic pre-recession projections of a huge shift in cargo from West Coast ports to East Coast ports no longer add up. Even the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which conducts feasibility studies for such projects and often does the dredging, expects little change in cargo volume at those ports.John Lanigan, the chief marketing officer for freight rail hauler Burlington Northern Santa Fe, which runs dozens of double-stacked container trains every day from West Coast ports to the Midwest and Southeast, said he didn't expect a major diversion of cargo to the canal."The opening of the canal is not going to make it any faster for ...

Panama Canal expansion has generated 20,470 jobs - few of them are qualified as needed The maritime industry faces great challenges and one is the lack of trained personnel to fill existing jobs and those generated by the Panama Canal expansion and the construction and upgrading of ports."Right now the mega projects such as mining, building the subway line and the Canal expansion have absorbed the low skilled labor that we have and this is a problem for the development of all businesses in the sector," said Javier Bru, CEO of EMI Marine.After four years into the canal expansion work, the project has generated 20,470 jobs. According to the Panama Canal Authority (ACP), after completing the work, there will be many jobs generated in logistics and transportation activities in the container transshipment ports and shipping agencies."Every day it costs more to get qualified personnel for this work. We have mainly to train internally to meet the requirements that companies have," affirmed the CEO of Panama Ports Company, Lucas Versari.He emphasizes that in the operational area it is a bit easier, but they are starting to show signs of lack of staff with a clear idea that this is a 24 ...

Panama Canal expansion promises much ANTIPATER of Sidon, a Greek poet, would be writing travel guides had he lived now. Back around 140 BC, he composed a list of the world's main theamata - literally, things to be seen - from the great Pyramid of Giza to the Colossus of Rhodes, a giant bronze statue of the Sun god Titan Helios that stood beside the island's harbour. Today, we know his list as the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. Lots of other people have composed similar lists. The American Society of Civil Engineers, for example, has the Empire State Building, the Channel Tunnel and the Golden Gate Bridge among its seven modern wonders. The Panama Canal is also on the society's list.And who could argue against it? Both the effort that went into its construction and the effect it has had on the world were Homeric. Its expansion, due for completion in just three years, is similarly Herculean. And among the project's benefits will be a substantial reduction in greenhouse gas emissions that even the Oracle at Delphi might not have foreseen.Spanish explorers first dragged ships the 50 miles across the Isthmus in 1514 and Charles V, the King ...

Bigger Canal + Bigger Ships = Less Pollution? The Panama Canal expansion will allow bigger ships with more cargo to pass from the Pacific to the Caribbean, which could result in less greenhouse gas emissions per volume of cargo shipped.Paul Stott and Peter Wright of Newcastle University believes the $6 billion canal expansion will allow new ships to be built beyond the 32.3 meter (106 feet) breadth restriction, known as the panamax. Wider ships can carry more cargo with proportionately less fuel, the researchers stated in the International Journal of Maritime Engineering."This is a great example of unintended consequences," said Stott in a press release."The potential savings in fuel costs are substantial, as is the consequent reduction in emissions, potentially saving up to 16% per tonne-mile," said Stott."This is important given that the International Maritime Organization estimates that shipping was responsible for about 2.7% of global emissions of CO2 in 2007 but warns that this may rise to between 12% and 18% by 2050 if the shipping industry does not take major steps to reduce emissions," Stott said.Building bigger ships doesn't require new technologies."Alternative fuels and new technologies will be vital for driving the marine industry forward to a more ...