Durban shipping and trade journalist Terry Hutson has reported in today’s Africa Ports & Ships Newsletter that at a sod-turning ceremony on 21 February 2019, work officially commenced on the Port of Ngqura’s future liquid bulk terminal.

The port of Ngqura liquid bulk tank farm will replace the existing facilities at the nearby port of Port Elizabeth.  The two ports are 22 km apart in the Eastern Cape province.

The new tank farm will develop the port of Ngqura’s liquid bulk capacity for commodities such as petroleum, diesel, jet fuel, illuminated paraffin and liquid petroleum gas.  Liquid bulk products will be transported to the port of Ngqura via ship and piped to the tank farm prior to local supply and/or local and global re-export.  The facility will service the oil majors, new entrants into the South African oil industry and international traders.

The infrastructure will be designed to accommodate vessels of up to 100,000 deadweight tonnage and will provide road loading facilities, inter-tank transfer/recirculation facilities, stock accounting in real time, office facilities for customers and an independent laboratory.

The new terminal is expected to commence operations at the end of 2020.