The Port Management Agency has announced a public procurement for the preparation of a feasibility study for the construction of a terminal for receiving and disposing of ship waste.
As stated in the project documentation as part of the announcement, the subject of the Feasibility Study is to determine the best solution and location in the capital for the disposal of waste generated by vessels / ships and other vessels on the waterways of the Republic of Serbia.
The bidders are asked, among other things, to analyze the current situation in terms of collecting and disposing of ship waste, comparative examples of best practice and practical solutions and proposing technical solutions for the terminal in Belgrade, as well as proposals for microlocations in the capital where construction would be possible.
The criterion for the selection of the most favorable bidder is the lowest offered price, the deadline for submission of bids is December 17.
By the way, the story about the construction of the ship waste terminal in Belgrade dates back to 2014, writes the eKapija portal. Even then, money was set aside for the preparation of a study on the construction of the first terminal for waste disposal, and the company in charge of preparing that documentation was also selected.
Earlier, the then Minister of Transport, Aleksandar Antic, stated that Serbia needs 9 terminals for ship waste, on the Danube, Sava and Tisza, because there are none, and that the Ministry will allocate 83 thousand euros for a study on the feasibility of building such a terminal in Belgrade.
Almost seven years later, neither Belgrade nor Serbia, according to Branislav Vajda, president of the Association of Professional Boatmen of Serbia, still have any terminal for disposing of ship waste.
– There is only a story about that, seven years ago, and the money for the project of building a terminal in Belgrade was given by the EU 10 years ago. The only thing we have, at the level of the entire country, is one of a total of three pontoons in Novi Sad, where ship waste disposal is organized, and four unsecured containers in Belgrade, at the pier on the Sava. An additional absurdity is that at the latter location, it was forbidden to dump garbage from ships all last year due to the danger of swine fever – states Vajda for eKapija.
According to him, Belgrade had perfect conditions on the vertical quay and the already existing infrastructure for ship waste disposal.
– In Vienna, such conditions as the port near Beton Hall have been cleverly used and the city practically lives from passenger ships that dock in the city center – says Vajda and adds that everywhere in Europe the disposal of ship waste has long been solved, and it is solved excellently.
In the Netherlands, according to him, they have even gone so far as to dispose of faeces from ships separately, they have built a pipeline by which faeces are disposed of directly into the sewage network.
– All that is actually very simple, it is only necessary to organize the removal of waste from passenger ships. In Europe, huge amounts of money are taken to dispose of bio-waste, because it is forbidden to throw it into the water. Suffice it to say that floating hotels of 150-200 people fill that 100-liter blue barrel with kitchen waste every five to six days. But in order to have any terminal, you have to have the infrastructure for bringing and taking away waste, and whether the waste will be hauled by boat or taken by truck and taken for recycling or destruction, it doesn’t matter to the ships, the point is that you can make money on all that. – Vajda points out and notes that in Germany and Austria, each of these segments, both garbage collection and recycling, is charged separately.
– In Austria, for example, they have specially built terminals for the disposal of garbage from cargo ships, which have much less garbage, and it is especially arranged for passenger ships that can dispose of waste on all pontoons where they dock, and that separate garbage and separate bio -waste. With the Austrians, ships can also manage the costs of garbage disposal, so they get the keys to the containers in advance in the number they need, and the bill is subsequently invoiced to the shipping company. Also, if they sort waste, disposal costs 1 euro per bag, and if they do not, then the price is 3 euros. And it is similar everywhere in Europe, since the border with Hungary was crossed – says the interlocutor of that portal.
In Serbia, however, according to him, foreigners cannot be surprised when they get answers to questions about where and how to dispose of garbage and bio-waste, they are baptized when they hear that we do not have organized recycling of ship waste.
– The problem is that in our country, those who make decisions about it have no idea, unlike us shipowners. They don’t even know that the sewage from the ships from five or six years ago no longer goes to the Danube or to the tanks as it used to be done, but is now being processed. Today, ships even have plants that resemble the human stomach and that process waste so that the remaining water can practically be drunk, and only such water can be returned to the Danube – states Vajda, B92 reports.
