A contractor consortium comprising Hakkers, De Klerk and Van Oord has completed the first phase of the Yangtze Canal widening project in the Port of Rotterdam, delivering a new tugboat quay with 12 berths and shore power facilities.

To accommodate the quay, the Yangtze Canal was widened by 500 metres along its southern side. The consortium has now commenced the second phase of the project, which involves the construction of 1,450 metres of quay wall featuring 20 new inland shipping berths — each equipped with shore power facilities — west of the existing Antarctica Quay. This will supplement the 10 existing berths already in place. A heavy load zone will also be constructed to facilitate the one-off transhipment of goods or specific materials.

The Yangtze Canal serves as the navigational route for large container vessels travelling to and from the APMT 2 and RWG terminals in the Prinses Amaliahaven. Both terminals are currently expanding their capacity and, according to the Port of Rotterdam Authority, traffic in the canal is expected to increase significantly in the near future. The widening works are intended to ensure safe passage for increasingly larger vessels accessing the Maasvlakte.

The new inland shipping berths will have a nautically guaranteed depth (NGD) of NAP –6.80 metres. To widen the navigational channel and create the berths, 1.4 million cbm of sand will be dredged and reused for land reclamation on Maasvlakte 2. Upon completion, the project is said to enable two-way traffic for container vessels of up to 24,000 TEU and prepare the canal — and, by extension, access to the Maasvlakte — for the next generation of container vessels.

Geopolymer concrete cuts emissions

A notable feature of the second phase is the use of approximately 10,000 cbm of geopolymer concrete in the upper section of the new quay wall. The material contains no cement and, according to the Port of Rotterdam Authority, reduces CO₂ emissions by around 50 percent compared with conventional concrete.

The Port of Rotterdam Authority manages approximately 80 kilometres of quay walls and 200 kilometres of embankments, and has indicated that further investments in new and replacement quay walls are planned in the coming years, with geopolymer concrete expected to be used more frequently.

The widening of the navigational channel at seabed level is planned to continue along the canal’s entire length over the coming years.