07 March 2024 PORT OF BARCELONA
The arrival of the BEST terminal OPS marks the beginning of the countdown to connect the first container ships next July. The Port of Barcelona holds meetings with several shipping companies to plan the arrival and connection of ships equipped with connections for OPS
The Port of Barcelona has already received the first OPS substation of the future network of connections for ships that is being deployed with the Nexigen project. This is the main piece of what will be the first Onshore Power Supply (OPS) system to supply electricity to container ships that arrive at the port, so that they can stop their engines while they are moored and thus reduce the emissions they generate.
The OPS substation is made up of six modules coupled in Denmark by the company PowerCon, awarded the contract to install the system in a “turnkey” format, and will allow up to two container ships to be connected simultaneously. Its arrival represents a milestone for the electrification project of the Hutchison Ports BEST terminal dock, where until now both the civil works and electrical network work and the deployment of cables to the dock had been carried out, coinciding with the works of terminal expansion.
During the next four months, the connection of the OPS will be completed with the arrival of the equipment that will be installed at the foot of the wet to connect the ships and all the necessary checks and tests will be carried out. The objective is, following the planned schedule, to begin supplying ships with clean energy with 100% renewable origin certification next July.
In parallel to this work, the Port of Barcelona holds meetings with several shipping companies to plan the arrival and connection of ships that are already equipped with connections for OPS. The OPS of the BEST terminal and the one being built at the Ferry Terminal will, in fact, function as a pilot test and will allow data and information to be collected on their operation in order to optimize the deployment of the rest of the OPS, as well as the media network. voltage that will supply them with electricity from renewable sources.
“The arrival of the BEST terminal OPS is a very important milestone in the deployment of the Nexigen project. "It is the fruit of years of work to make the first system of this type in southern Europe a reality and the first piece of a network that will significantly reduce the emissions generated by port activity,"
Lluís Salvadó. President of the Port of Barcelona
The Nexigen project is one of the Port of Barcelona's big bets to reduce CO2 emissions from port operations by 50% until 2030 and become a carbon-neutral port before 2050. Specifically, the electrification of the main docks of the Port de Barcelona will allow the elimination of 66,000 tons of CO2 and 1,234 tons of NOx from the emissions generated by port activity.
The Head of Shorepower Department of the Port of Barcelona, Ana Arévalo; the director of operations of BEST, Vicenç Roig; the CEO of BEST, Guillermo Belcastro; the president of the Port of Barcelona, Lluís Salvadó, and the partner of PowerCon, Peter Castberg.
The OPS installation project at Hutchison Ports BEST is co-funded by the Sustainable and Digital Transportation Support Program in competitive concurrence in Measure 11: support for the deployment of alternative fuels in ports and airports (Project code: PATSYD/22/00061 ).
