EIB loans Rotterdam Port Authority 100 million euros

EIB loans Rotterdam Port Authority 100 million euros    The European Union’s financing institution, the European Investment Bank (EIB), has granted a loan worth 100 million euros ($125.8 million) to the Rotterdam Port Authority to build the “Delta Barge Feeder Terminal” and expand the existing Europe Container Terminals (ECT) Delta container terminal, both in the Maasvlakte area of the port.
   ECT is owned by the Hong Kong-based Hutchison Port Holdings Group, the world’s largest terminal operator.
   “The EIB is supporting this port expansion project because it will enlarge the trans-European network of sea ports,” said EIB President Philippe Maystadt at the loan signing ceremony in Brussels on Wednesday.
   “This project will further increase the Port of Rotterdam’s container handling capacity. In addition, the barge feeder terminal will strengthen the multimodal nature of traffic flows from the port, thereby reducing traffic problems and the concomitant environmental pollution in the wider Rotterdam area,” Maystadt said.
   The container terminal expansion will cover an area of 60 hectares (148 acres) while the dedicated feeder terminal will occupy about seven hectares (17 acres) and have a quay with a length of 800 meters (2,625 feet) and a depth of almost 11 meters (36 feet). Both projects are scheduled for completion by the end of 2010.
   The EIB previously loaned 200 million euros ($251.6 million) for the 2.5-million-TEU deep-sea Euromax container terminal, west of Maasvlakte, scheduled to start operations December 2007. ECT is a joint partner in the Euromax project.