Krishnapatnam port to get liquid bulk cargo terminal with Ro-Ro facility

As part of its expansion plan, the privately run Krishnapatnam Port (in Andhra's Nellore district) is looking at building a liquid bulk cargo terminal of one million tonnes capacity, along with a Ro-Ro facility (roll-on/roll-off, ships designed to carry wheeled vehicles, directly driven on and off), that would cater to demand from the oil and power sectors.

According to Anil Yendluri, chief executive, the liquid bulk cargo facility would be built in collaboration with LNG Bharat Group. The project would comprise Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) floating storage, onshore buffer storage tank, re-gasification, etc. This is expected to make available natural gas to the industrial regions spread over the southern districts of Andhra and Telangana and in northern Tamil Nadu. It is likely to be the first LNG import terminal with its own natural gas pipeline on the east coast.

At present, Krishnapatnam caters to traffic from all commodities except petroleum, oil, and lubricants. It caters to intra-Asian trade, mainly headed to or from Bangladesh, Myanmar, Vietnam, Japan, and China. "Our port would act like a trans-shipment hub on the east coast," Yendluri said.

In 2015-16, the port handled cargo traffic of 118,000 TEUs (twenty-foot equivalent unit or containers), up to 256,000 TEUs in 2016-17. By the end of 2017-18, it is likely to be 500,000 TEUs. The current utilisation of the port is 50-55 per cent.

The plan is to expand operations by having 44 berths, from 11 at present. The 18.5 metre draught in its harbour is likely to be increased to 22 metres.

An initial investment of Rs 8 billion was made to commission the port on a build-operate-share-transfer basis for a period of 50 years. The second phase of expansion is through and the third phase will come after a few years, for 200 million tonne per annum capacity.

Krishnapatnam currently handles fertiliser of all types and grades. It also handles 1.5 million tonnes of granite export every year. Beside end-to-end logistics services; it now has the capacity for car export, too.