12/17/2008 11h09
Cosipa and Fosfértil make original project
Valor Econômico - 12/17/2008
When the dredging of the Piaçaguera channel is concluded, Cosipa will save the equivalent to one ship in every four ships used to carry up to 40 thousand tons of steel per ship. Nowadays, the ships are restricted to 30 thousand tons due to the aggradations occurred in more than one decade. Cosipa and Fosfértil, both with their own terminals, got together to carry out the first dredging with environmental control of the country, at the cost of R$ 50 million (US$ 21.7 million). A critical region under the environmental perspective, it required heavy compensations for the displacement of the sediments taken from the depths of the waters, upon a four-stage project, one of them concluded in August (along the mooring berths), another stage underway (final part of the channel), the third to be licensed and the fourth stage, which was licensed in November, has not started yet. According to Cosipa, the maintenance dredging is necessary to keep safe navigability. The company says it is necessary only to recover the normal and safe navigability conditions, allowing ships that operate at their maximum capacity. But the work for deepening the channel in the port of Santos, in the segment maintained by the Codesp, will generate unevenness. While the port will feature a 15meter draft, Cosipa and Forfétil's stretch will present a 12-meter draft. Engineer Sérgio Pompéia, specialized in port environmental matters, who knows the estuary of Santos, affirms the "irregularity has to be made smoothly. If it is done in abruptly, it can cause erosion; it is necessary to make adjustments to the area of contact (between the two levels of dredging)". According to Paulino Vicente, Codesp infrastructure officer, "in fact, there will be greater aggradations in the region, but this increase of the volume is foreseen in the two maintenance dredging cycles which we are going to contract; besides, the maintenance will not commence only after the end of the deepening, it will occur at the same time", he says. With the increase of the canal and the enlargement of the estuary for navigation, which at some points will get to 450 meters, on the average, the normal volume to be dredged will go from the average of 2.8 million cubic meters a year, to 3.8 million cubic meters.
