• Thursday, March 28, 2024
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APMT Nigeria to invest US$100m in acquisition of 20 new cranes for WACT

APMT Nigeria-Chart

Following the earlier announced terminal capacity expansion project, APM Terminals Nigeria said its perfecting plans to put US$100 million investment into the acquisition of 20 new rubber tyred gantry (RTG) cranes for the West Africa Container Terminal (WACT).

This was in line with the recently announced plans by WACT to upgrade its container handling operation from reach stackers to RTGs in order to achieve greater stacking density, increase throughput and productivity.

“This is part of our earlier announced expansion of the existing terminal capacity, a US$100 million investment, that started last year and that will be fully in place shortly. The expansion plan will deliver sufficient capacity to meet the envisaged growth in East Nigeria for the next 15 years,” said Mohammed Ahmed, managing director of APMT Nigeria.

To achieve this, the leading terminal operator has selected Konecranes to build the 20 new rubber tyred gantry cranes for WACT.

According to the company, the order was booked in two parts, the first in December 2019 and the second in January 2020 while delivery is scheduled for fourth quarter of 2020 and second quarter of 2021.

The Konecranes RTGs that were ordered are diesel-driven, 16-wheel machines stacking 1-over-5 high and 7 containers + truck lane wide. They would be equipped with active load control, auto-steering and auto-TOS reporting.

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Recall that BusinessDay reported recently that WACT, which has become the most preferred container terminal outside the Lagos area and the gateway to Eastern Nigeria, said it has perfected arrangements to begin the Phase 2 of its terminal upgrade within the next 18 months.

The report has it that Noah Sheriff, commercial manager of WACT, said the Phase 2 upgrade will consist of the acquisition of three additional Mobile Harbour Cranes (MHCs) to bring the number of MHCs at the terminal to five; acquisition of 20 Rubber Tyre Gantry Cranes (RTGs); three Reach Stackers; 13 terminal trucks and trailers as well as an empty container handler.

He said the upgrade will include deployment of reefer racks with 600 plugs capacity, as well as expansion and paving of the current yard by 13 hectares, building new workshop and new terminal gate complex.

“We anticipate additional volume growth as more and more shipping lines, importers and exporters continue to develop confidence in our ability to handle their cargo. This further investment is to ensure that we are well prepared to handle the additional business in the future,” he said.

WACT is located in Onne Port, part of the Onne Oil and Gas Free Zone in Nigeria. It was one of the first container terminals to be built in Nigeria under public, private ownership.

AMAKA ANAGOR-EWUZIE with agency report