14 | South Port NZ Ltd T T Richard Loader Port in deep water – a sweet spot to be REGIONAL DEVELOPMENT COMMERCIAL, INDUSTRIAL, MARINE AND DOMESTIC ELECTRICIANS 115 Barrow St, P O Box 36, Bluff 9842 Phone: 03 212 8822 Email: admin@bluffelectrical.co.nz Pleased to support the team at South Port Ltd Named Kia Whakaū by the local Rūnanga, South Port’s completion of a major infrastructure project to deepen its channel and inner harbour has been a triumphant success, and very much a voyage of discovery for all involved. The project was completed in September of 2023, and Frank O’Boyle, South Port’s Project Director throughout the seven year journey, says it was a once in a career opportunity. “As an engineer, I loved it. From when the Board made the decision in 2016 to look at it, I spent half my week in a vault looking at all the old files, researching the history of the Port’s dredging and the history of Bluff. “I just learned so much about the whole process. I was supported by a great team here at South Port. We have some wonderful young engineers that were able to come along on the journey.” Located in Bluff Harbour South Port is New Zealand’s southernmost commercial deepwater port, providing the full range of marine services, cargo and container shipping, and on-site warehousing for domestic and international customers. The project, which has increased the Port’s draft from 9.7 metres to 10.7 metres, improves navigational safety margins, and increases capacity enabling vessels to carry heavier loads. Draft is the maximum depth of any part of the vessel, including appendages such as rudders, and propellers. The more cargo that is placed on a ship, the deeper it sits in the water. Bluff Harbour has a granite rock bottom and is quite unique from other ports around New Zealand that have a sediment or soft bottom. South Port was last deepened in 1979/80 through a drill and blast campaign, followed by dredging through the ‘80s. In 1987 the draft was set at 9.7 metres, but much in shipping has changed over the last forty years, says Frank. “Vessels including their widths and lengths are changing and cargo volumes are increasing. So, a number of factors triggered the need for another step-change at South Port. “By deepening the port, and increasing the draft by a metre we’ve enabled the vessels to sit deeper in the water, creating the opportunity for customers to put more cargo in the vessel. That makes their operations more efficient as they can reduce the number of vessels required to carry the cargo. It was also important that we obtained customer support, both through charging structures and taking advantage of the increased depth in the channel.” The impetus for the step-change commenced during a strategy workshop in 2016. At that stage there was a conception that an extra two metres of depth was required at an eye watering cost of $200m, because of the T T to page 16 extent of granite rock on the seabed. “In the end we found a sweet spot at a metre that will improve efficiencies for existing customers and also future proof the Port for other cargo that might come along in the decades to come.” In 2019, still under the assumption that drilling and blasting would be required to deepen the channel and inner harbour, a team of specialists were assembled to produce reports that would provide Environment Southland with a high level of comfort that everything had been considered to support the consent application. “That included the impact drilling, blasting and dredging would have on the harbour’s marine ecology, underwater acoustics, airborne acoustics, marine mammals, and ecology,” explains Frank.
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