The OT Logistics Capital Group, a leading inland waterway operator in Poland, has completed a trial river transport of 250 tons of fertilizers for Grupa Azoty on the route from Kędzierzyn-Koźle to Police.
The trial transport aims to verify conditions for inland shipping on the middle and lower Oder. The success of the voyage will help in deciding whether to establish a regular shipping route between Grupa Azoty plants in Kędzierzyn-Koźle and Police, and will open new opportunities for transporting goods from Silesia to the north-west of the country.
– In the past, we have already used inland shipping as a means of transporting our products. We have our own port and a connection to the Gliwice Canal. We want to join the government’s plans to make the Oder navigable and take advantage of the associated business opportunities. Water transport is more ecological and cost-effective than road transport, so we would be happy to benefit from it in the transport of raw materials to the company and the transport of our products to customers – said Kamil Bortniczuk, member of the management board of Grupa Azoty ZAK S.A.
The barge was loaded in Kędzierzyn on Thursday, October 26. The transport of 250 tons of fertilizers on the Kędzierzyn-Koźle – Police route was carried out by a BM-500 motor barge. The barge will have to cover 670 km through the Kędzierzyn Canal, the Gliwice Canal, and the Oder River. The voyage requires passing through 25 locks and is expected to take 6-7 days.
– We hope that the trial voyage will confirm the possibility of regular transport along the Oder Waterway from the Opole region to the north of the country. We also want to point out how important a complement to transport inland shipping can be and how significant the investments in improving navigability on the Oder Waterway planned by the Ministry of Maritime Economy and Inland Navigation are – said Andrzej Klimek, Vice President of the Management Board and Director of the Inland Shipping Division of OT Logistics. – Water transport is the most environmentally friendly form of transport, which allows for relieving road and rail transport. Inland shipping can play a special role in the delivery of goods to ports in Szczecin/Świnoujście, Gdańsk, and Gdynia, but also, for example, in the transport of coal from Upper Silesia to other regions in the country. In July, we resumed river transport of coal from Gliwice to Wrocław. Since then, our barges have already transported about 70,000 tons of coal to Kogeneracja Wrocław. Now we are taking another step towards restoring the transport function to rivers.
Investments planned by the Ministry of Maritime Economy and Inland Navigation, as defined in the “Assumptions for the development plans of inland waterways in Poland for 2016-2020 with a perspective until 2030,” aim, among other things, to achieve international navigability class on the Oder Waterway and integrate it into the network of European waterways. Additionally, by acceding to the UN AGN convention, Poland has committed to adapting its main waterways to class IV navigability.