company, which operates the canal, had to
invest $7 billion in a nine year construction
project to add an extra lane of traffic and
expand the locks. The expanded canal
opened in 2016, but the biggest container
vessels, MSC Oscar and Maersk’s Triple E
class, are still too large to pass. The world’s
biggest cruise ship, Harmony of the Seas,
would be able to use the canal, but it is too
tall to pass under the Bridge of the Americas,
which links North and South America.
During the past 10 years, the Panama
Canal has lost much of the valuable container
vessel traffic to the larger Suez Canal. In
2013, Maersk began to carry its goods from
North America to Asia the other way around
the world through the Suez Canal, though the
route is about 1,000 km longer. The Suez
Canal has also been expanded to keep pace
with developments, and in 2016, an extra
lane of traffic was added, which cost the
Egyptian authorities DKK 59 billion. The canal
can now accommodate all existing container
vessels, but it could be a short respite. The
MSC Oscar can barely pass, and new
container vessels, which will be even bigger,
have been ordered by several shipping
companies for delivery in 2017.PORTS CANNOT GROW BIGGER
The new container vessels will be able to
carry 21,000 containers, making sea
transport even cheaper and more eco-
friendly. However, this seems to be the upper
limit, according to several leading shipping
companies. Infrastructure cannot keep pace.
Globally, only 20 ports have the capacity
to handle vessels carrying more than 19,000
containers, and although quite a few ports
are expanding, not by far all of them have the
space required. The ports of major cities are
often located close to other built-up areas
and cannot just expand. Moreover, it does not
make sense to build ports further away fromthe cities, as in that case, the goods would
need to be transported by truck.
Even so, the shipping industry is talking
about an ultimate new class of vessels,
which can carry 35,000 containers.
If vessels which are considerably larger
than the MSC Oscar will one day be a fact of
life, they might be able to take a new short
cut between the Atlantic and the Pacific
Oceans. In Nicaragua, the government has
made an agreement with a Chinese
consortium to build a 278-km-long canal,
which is to compete with the Panama Canal.
In order to realise the ambitious project, 4.5
billion m^3 of soil will have to be removed –
enough to bury all of Manhattan up to the
21st floor. The link will be built via the San
Juan river, and if it is finished some day, it will
be able to accommodate ships which are
larger than the MSC Oscar and reduce the
time of sailing between New York City and
California by one day.The world’s biggest cruise
ship, Harmony of the Seas,
has 18 decks. The U-shaped
hull keeps the tall ship stable.
BERNARD BIGER/ROYAL CARIBBEANTRANSPORT SHIPS